Set Me Free

'Somehow, it's harder than facing my kidnappers.'

"Sometimes it seems safer to hold it all in, where the only person who can judge is yourself."

I was trying to move on.

It was a lot harder than I first believed. I thought I would come home and fall straight back into the routine I always had, that life would just carry on as it should. It didn't.

It turns out I wasn't the same person as I was before it all happened. The things that used to make me smile no longer had an effect, the things that used to make me happy didn't. I saw things differently than I did before.

The hardest part was leaving the house. Before, I used to get bored if I stayed in too long, I was always out, always doing something. Now, I just wanted to hide away. I lived in constant fear that it would happen again, I no longer felt safe walking the streets alone.

Simple things, like going to the shop for food, now felt like this impossible mission, something I had to fight to achieve. I didn't like the person I had become; I didn't like the fear.

I had come to realise that this was it, this was a part of me moving on. It wasn't going to fix itself overnight, I wasn't going to be able to walk straight back into the life I had lived.

My world was different now and I was different as a result.

Holly knew that something was different. She was gentler with me, kinder. Before, we lived a friendship based on teasing and put downs. Now, she was acting like I was something fragile she didn't want to break.

I felt like I was going to break.

Every time I heard an unfamiliar noise, every time something startled me, I was right back there in that warehouse. Right back to that girl who was broken and afraid. She had become a part of me, another side of me I wish I didn't have.

"What are you going to do about work?" Holly asked me over breakfast one day. I didn't have a response, didn't know what I possibly could do about work. How could I return to my job when I could barely set foot outside my house. How could I be a part of the world again.

"I don't know," I tell her honestly. Holly doesn't reply, simply nods and goes back to eating her Coco Pops. She doesn't push me; doesn't demand to know what I will do about rent. Some part of me wishes that she did. I want her to be the same with me, to act the same way as she always has, but I know she can't. She can't be the usual Holly until I can be the usual Elizabeth.

I didn't know how I was going to get there.

"How about therapy?" my mum suggests over lunch one day. I had thought about it before and then instantly disregarded the thought. I didn't want someone poking and prodding at the facts, I didn't want someone to make me remember it all. Remembering would make it worse and I wasn't prepared to dig up that dirt again.

I decided to bury it deep down in my subconscious, locked away in a box never to be opened. I honestly believed that forgetting was the only way I could ever move on. If I acted like it never happened, if I pretended that everything was okay, then one day it maybe would be.

"Okay," Holly says as she bursts into my room one Saturday night, "enough moping. You need to down this shot, put on your sluttiest outfit and come and get blind drunk with us in a crappy club."

I didn't know how to respond. How could I tell her that I didn't feel safe doing it, how could I tell her that I would be looking over my shoulder all night in fear that somehow one of those men would be there to take me away again. How could I tell her that I felt safer at home?

I couldn't.

I took the shot of vodka from her, downed it in one and let the burn take my thoughts away from the warehouse. It was only for a second before they all came crashing back, but it was a nice relief to have them gone.

I decided she was right. I needed to get drunk, I needed to let the power of alcohol take away the memories bouncing around my mind. I needed to be free from it all, even if it was only for one night.

I put on my shortest dress, I did my make up for the first time in nearly a month, I made myself look like I had it together. I did such a good job, I almost fooled myself.

We spent the next couple of hours drinking. I drank anything and everything I could and with each drink, the thoughts disappeared. I laughed, really laughed for the first time in ages. I smiled and had fun, and for a while, I was me again.

"So," Luke one of my best friends ask us all, "who is on the pull this evening?"

Luke was gay and decided a very long time ago that it was his job to be the ultimate wing man to all of us. Over the years he had done an excellent job. Evenings out with him usually ended up with one of us having an awkward breakfast the next morning. Luke always felt extremely proud of himself when this was the case.

"Not for me," I announce, taking yet another shot from the vodka bottle, "tonight I will be flying solo thank you."

Everyone looked at me as I said this. Usually, someone would make a slut joke, usually someone would scoff and point out that it was usually me that was sitting through the awkward breakfasts. They didn't tonight.

It came crashing down on me then, another reminder of how things had changed. My friends weren't their usual selves around me, instead they found themselves biting their tongues and trying to be considerate.

It didn't help.

I wanted them to be them, I wanted them to not have to step on egg shells around me, but I knew that they couldn't help it. In their eyes, I was fragile and you had to be very careful around fragile things.

"I'm sure Holly will be game though," I say to direct the attention away from myself, to turn the pity eyes off. It works and instantly they are all back to themselves as if they have been snapped out of a dream.

I get up and make my way to the bathroom.

I couldn't stand to sit there and listen to them all joke, to all laugh knowing that I wasn't truly a part of it. I was here, I was still me, but at the same time I wasn't. I never knew how much everything would change.

I sit there for a while, collecting myself before I feel brave enough to go back.

I open the door and make my way back to the living room.

The sound of hushed whispers stops me in my tracks.

"She's so distant now, I don't know how to handle it."

"Did you see the way she was hitting that vodka bottle. I mean our girl can usually drink but she's taking it to the extreme tonight.

"Maybe she has a drinking problem."

"Maybe she's having a breakdown."

"Maybe she's changed."

I have never heard my friends talk behind my back before, I never realised it was something we did as a friendship group. We have always been extremely upfront with each other, there have never been any secrets between us. Yet, there they are, talking about me as if I am a problem that needs fixing, as if I am a problem that they can't quite solve.

I almost cry as I hear them carry on, stabbing the knife in harder and harder. I don't know what to do, I feel like my feet are glued to the floor and I can't move, can't face them.

I want to scream at them, let them know that I just heard everything they've said about me, but I can't. If I went out there screaming and shouting, I would just prove their point, show them that I am as unstable as they believe I am.

I decide to show them how normal I can be. I put on my bravest face, I gather all the courage that helped me survive that warehouse and face my best friends.

Somehow, it's harder than facing my kidnappers.