Callie inhaled slowly. Her hands were at her sides, off camera, while she sat on her bedroom love seat for their session. He couldn’t see her hands fist and relax.
“What didn’t she do? She called me names, she played mean tricks on me, she spread lies about me. She even spit on me.” She’d done even worse things, but Callie didn’t want to delve into them.
“That must have been very upsetting,” the doctor said in his calm voice.
“No kidding.” She couldn’t help her sarcastic tone.
“Did you do anything to retaliate?” he asked.
“I didn’t dare. If I’d tried, she would have worked twice as hard to hurt me back.”
“What about telling your father and stepmother? Didn’t they step in to discipline her?”
That was a joke. “No, they didn’t do anything to stop her.”
Dr. Hammond’s eyebrows shot up. “Really? You told them what was going on and they didn’t handle it?”
Callie shook her head. She swallowed the lump in her throat before speaking. “I told my stepmother about what Wendy did once and she told me to stop being a baby and if I told my father I’d be punished.” Her stepmother’s form of punishment. Something else Callie didn’t want to recall.
“So your father didn’t know about your stepsister’s treatment of you?”
“I went to him once, and he said he’d take care of it, but Wendy continued to harass me.” Her dad had talked to Wendy but she’d gone immediately to her mother, who’d then punished Callie for telling her dad. Her stomach tightened. That was the first and last time Callie had gone to her father for help.
“You didn’t go back again to tell him it hadn’t stopped?”
“Isn’t our time almost up?” she asked instead.
His gaze went to where he kept a clock across from his desk. “We have five minutes left.”
She needed to change the subject away from her family.
“You didn’t answer my question,” he persisted.
“What did you ask?” She knew very well what he’d asked, but her mind had gone blank when it came to changing the subject.
“Why didn’t you tell your father that your stepsister was still bothering you?”
Bothering her? That was definitely whitewashing the situation, but she didn’t correct Dr. Hammond. At least not today with five minutes—or less—left in their session.
She sucked in a breath. “Because I got punished for telling on Wendy.” Her hands fisted at her sides.
Dr. Hammond made a notation and looked up as he asked, “What kind of punishment?”
Before she readied herself to answer, his phone rang. He held up one finger. “I’m sorry. I usually have my phone turned off. This must be an emergency.” He picked up his cell phone to look at it. “Yes, I’ll have to call this person back right away.” He pressed something on the phone and the ringing ended. “Let’s stop here for now and we’ll pick it up next week at the same time. Does that work for you?”
She nodded, hoping her words came out clear as she said, “Yes, that’s fine.”
By the time she closed her laptop, she felt wrung out emotionally and didn’t know if she could continue to do this week after week.
And all she’d told Dr. Hammond so far was that she’d seen her stepsister, who’d bullied Callie their entire childhood. She’d barely scratched the surface.
* * *
THE SUN HAD long set and a partial moon was barely visible in the cloudy sky when Tyler parked on the street in front of Aunt Poppy’s. Training had gone well that evening and he was pleased to see the improvement in his officers since he’d taken over as Chief of Police.
He walked up to the porch, lit only by matching globes on either side of the front door. His foot was on the bottom step when he realized someone was in the shadows, seated on the far side of the porch glider.
“Callie?”
“Hi.” Her voice was so soft he could barely hear her.
“Is everything all right?”
She didn’t say anything at first. “I’m fine.” Her legs were tucked under her body and her arms were crossed over her chest.
He wanted to disagree, considering her body language and quiet tone of voice, but he didn’t. “I’m going to get myself a beer. Would you like one?” He didn’t know why he was pursuing a conversation with her. He should just leave her alone.
He couldn’t see her reaction, except for a slight turn of her head in his direction.
“Sure,” she finally answered, not moving from her curled-up position.
“Let me check on the girls and I’ll be back with a couple of cold ones in a few.”
His eyes had adjusted to the dimness enough to see her nod, so he went into the house.
The girls were already in bed and asleep, their night-light allowing him to make his way between their twin beds. He gently kissed them good-night on their foreheads and covered up Alexis, who tended to kick and squirm all night. He quietly exited their bedroom, closing their door as he left.
In his own room, he changed from his uniform into shorts and a T-shirt. Then he slipped his bare feet into a pair of canvas shoes to go down to the basement fridge where he kept the beer. He jogged back up the stairs with two beers and went out the front door to the porch. “I should have asked if you wanted a glass.” He held out a bottle to Callie. He’d already popped the top with the opener he kept on top of the basement fridge. “I can get one for you.”
“This is fine.” She uncurled her legs and reached for the bottle. “Thank you.” Her fingers brushed his momentarily. She took a long swallow and he wondered why he’d even noticed when their hands touched.
Instead of sitting next to her on the glider, he pulled a rocker closer and sat before taking a long swallow of ice-cold beer. “Mmm, that’s exactly what I needed.”
When Callie remained silent, he grasped for something to say in the uncomfortable silence. “Bad day?”
She set her beer on the small, white-wicker end table next to the glider and folded her hands on her lap. “Let’s just say that days in Whittler’s Creek are nothing like what I’m used to.”
“How’s the cleaning going at the community center?”
“We made a huge dent today, but there’s still a lot to do tomorrow.”
“Must be exhausting work. You have an office job, right?”
“I do.” She picked up her beer and took a sip. “It’s not so much the physical toll. I work out several mornings a week.” She set the beer back on the table. “It’s the filth. I swear this must be the first time in a dozen years that some of that stuff has been touched with a cleaning rag.”
“You’re probably right. Do you think you’ll be done after tomorrow?”
She hesitated, as if considering his question. “If we get the same amount of people to help out as we did today, I think we have a good chance of finishing.”
“Great.” But he’d said it jokingly. “That means I’ll have to find something new for you to do after Friday’s soup kitchen.”
“I’d prefer more work like at the soup kitchen, but I’m sure you’ll come up with something disgusting like picking up trash and cleaning out grease traps.” She sounded resigned to the fact.
He