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Book: Dark Secrets 2: No Time to Die; The Deep End of Fear by Elizabeth Chandler
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Authors: Elizabeth Chandler
Tags: Fiction, Death, Family, Juvenile Fiction, Interpersonal relations, Actors, Murder, Ghosts, Horror Tales; American, Mystery and detective stories, Sisters, Actors and actresses, Problem families, Dysfunctional families, Horror stories, Camps, Family Problems, Teenagers and Death, Tutors and Tutoring, Young Adult Fiction; American
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chair, then seated herself on the bed a few feet away.
"Are you worried about your role in the play?" she asked.
What could I say? No, I'm worried about my dead sister haunting me. "Sort of."
"Wel get you over the stage fright, Jenny, truly we will. tell me, do you remember how it started?"
"How?" I repeated.
"Or maybe when," she suggested.
"I don't know—I just always had it, at least as far back as kindergarten. I was supposed to recite a nursery rhyme for graduation, 'Little Bo Peep.' We have a video of me standing silently on stage, my mortarboard crooked, the tassel hanging in my face, my eyes like those of a deer caught in headlights."
She laughed. "Oh, my!"
"Why do you ask?"
"I was looking for a clue as to why stage fright happens to you. Psychologists say that performance anxiety is often rooted in unhappy childhood experiences, such as rejection by one's parents, or perhaps physical or verbal abuse by those who are close to the child."
"I wasn't rejected or abused," I said quickly. "Nothing terrible has ever happened to me." Til last summer, I added silently.
She smoothed the bedcover with her hand. "Sometimes memories of traumatic events can be repressed, so that the individual doesn't consciously remember those events, and therefore doesn't know why she is reacting to a situation that is similar in some way."
"I don't think that's it," I said politely.
"Let me give you an example," Maggie continued. "A child is wearing a certain kind of suntan lotion. That day she watches someone drown at the beach. Years later she happens to buy the same brand of lotion. She puts it on and finds herself paralyzed with fear. She doesn't know why, but she can't go on with whatever she planned to do at that moment. The smell has triggered the feelings of the traumatic event she has long since repressed. Only by remembering the event, understanding what has triggered such an extreme response, can she overcome it."
I shifted in my chair, uncomfortable with the psychological talk. "Repressed memory isn't my problem," I told her. "But I will try the relaxation exercises you mentioned."
"And the incremental exposure."
"That, too."
She smiled agreeably. "still need a walk?"
"Yeah."
"Stay on this block within the area of the four houses we're occupying. It's perfectly safe, but I'm an old worrywart. Check in with me in twenty minutes, all right?"
I nodded. "Thanks."
For the first few minutes I sat on the front steps of Drama House and gazed at the night sky. Across the road the tall tower on Stoddard cut a dark pattern out of the glittering sky, its clock glowing like a second moon.
I walked up and down the block, then circled Drama House, curious to see my room from the outside. Just as I reached the back of the house, I heard a noise from the fraternity next door, a grunt, then a thud, like a fall that had been muffled by grass. A guy swore softly. I peered around the lumpy trunk of an old cherry tree at the same time that Mike, standing by a window of the frat, turned to look over his shoulder. He grimaced when he saw me.
Maybe he thought I'd mind my own business and walk on, for a moment later he checked to see if I was still there and grimaced again. I wasn't moving; I wanted to know what was going on.
He threw a stone against a second-floor window and someone raised the shade. "I need your help," Mike called quietly.
He waited—I guessed for his helper to come down-stairs—and looked back over his shoulder a third time.
"still here," I said.
The light in the first-floor room went on. The shade rolled up—it was the guys' bathroom. Maybe I shouldn't be looking, I thought, but of course I did. A stubborn window screen was yanked up.
"Ready?" I heard Mike ask the guy inside, then he leaned over, grunting and pull ing. I stepped to the right of the tree to get a better view and saw a heap of a person on the ground, then a head come up above a set of shoulders as Mike heaved him onto the windowsill.
"Got a
"Are you worried about your role in the play?" she asked.
What could I say? No, I'm worried about my dead sister haunting me. "Sort of."
"Wel get you over the stage fright, Jenny, truly we will. tell me, do you remember how it started?"
"How?" I repeated.
"Or maybe when," she suggested.
"I don't know—I just always had it, at least as far back as kindergarten. I was supposed to recite a nursery rhyme for graduation, 'Little Bo Peep.' We have a video of me standing silently on stage, my mortarboard crooked, the tassel hanging in my face, my eyes like those of a deer caught in headlights."
She laughed. "Oh, my!"
"Why do you ask?"
"I was looking for a clue as to why stage fright happens to you. Psychologists say that performance anxiety is often rooted in unhappy childhood experiences, such as rejection by one's parents, or perhaps physical or verbal abuse by those who are close to the child."
"I wasn't rejected or abused," I said quickly. "Nothing terrible has ever happened to me." Til last summer, I added silently.
She smoothed the bedcover with her hand. "Sometimes memories of traumatic events can be repressed, so that the individual doesn't consciously remember those events, and therefore doesn't know why she is reacting to a situation that is similar in some way."
"I don't think that's it," I said politely.
"Let me give you an example," Maggie continued. "A child is wearing a certain kind of suntan lotion. That day she watches someone drown at the beach. Years later she happens to buy the same brand of lotion. She puts it on and finds herself paralyzed with fear. She doesn't know why, but she can't go on with whatever she planned to do at that moment. The smell has triggered the feelings of the traumatic event she has long since repressed. Only by remembering the event, understanding what has triggered such an extreme response, can she overcome it."
I shifted in my chair, uncomfortable with the psychological talk. "Repressed memory isn't my problem," I told her. "But I will try the relaxation exercises you mentioned."
"And the incremental exposure."
"That, too."
She smiled agreeably. "still need a walk?"
"Yeah."
"Stay on this block within the area of the four houses we're occupying. It's perfectly safe, but I'm an old worrywart. Check in with me in twenty minutes, all right?"
I nodded. "Thanks."
For the first few minutes I sat on the front steps of Drama House and gazed at the night sky. Across the road the tall tower on Stoddard cut a dark pattern out of the glittering sky, its clock glowing like a second moon.
I walked up and down the block, then circled Drama House, curious to see my room from the outside. Just as I reached the back of the house, I heard a noise from the fraternity next door, a grunt, then a thud, like a fall that had been muffled by grass. A guy swore softly. I peered around the lumpy trunk of an old cherry tree at the same time that Mike, standing by a window of the frat, turned to look over his shoulder. He grimaced when he saw me.
Maybe he thought I'd mind my own business and walk on, for a moment later he checked to see if I was still there and grimaced again. I wasn't moving; I wanted to know what was going on.
He threw a stone against a second-floor window and someone raised the shade. "I need your help," Mike called quietly.
He waited—I guessed for his helper to come down-stairs—and looked back over his shoulder a third time.
"still here," I said.
The light in the first-floor room went on. The shade rolled up—it was the guys' bathroom. Maybe I shouldn't be looking, I thought, but of course I did. A stubborn window screen was yanked up.
"Ready?" I heard Mike ask the guy inside, then he leaned over, grunting and pull ing. I stepped to the right of the tree to get a better view and saw a heap of a person on the ground, then a head come up above a set of shoulders as Mike heaved him onto the windowsill.
"Got a
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