Excerpt from "Necessary Tension"/ Immaculate Demolition

She looked up to see that she had finally reached the door at Mark’s house. She felt the tension start to coalesce in her body. She called it “the wall”. It was the feeling that overcame the muscles all over her body, causing them to tense up to the consistency of a rock. The primal fear from that terrible night when she woke up on the floor still lingered.

It became hard to move again. She looked at the door and knocked.

Mark answered the knock by telling her to let herself in. It was probably a good idea since it gave her another chance to feel like she was in control.

One foot in front of the other.

She strolled into the living room and found Mark organizing some books on his shelf. He stopped to look at her with a warm smile and asked, “How have you been?”

“I’m all right” she replied.

“Good”.

He went back to work on his bookshelf but continued talking.

“You said that you wanted to hang out. Go grab yourself a beer and chill out”.

He had no idea. He made everything feel so normal. That was why it had to be him.

“Are you expecting any company?” Allison blurted out.

Mark stopped what he was doing and stared back at her with quizzical look.

“No. Why?”

Life just got a little bit easier. She even started to feel a little bit flush. Allison smiled, stared, and said nothing for a moment.

“What’s going on?” he asked.

“I need to talk to you about my recovery. You’re a very important part of it.”