He said it in that voice of his which he probably thinks is calming and hypnotic, but which is actually so monotonous I have trouble staying awake during the sessions. ‘Milly, I think you should keep a journal; a private record of all your hopes and fears. Pour it all out on the page. Say what you’re really feeling.’ Huh, what a joke. He’s not saying what he’s really feeling; what he actually means is, ‘Milly, you come here to talk about what happened last April, only you won’t, so I’m hoping you’ll write about it instead and let me off the hook.’ Sure enough, he followed on by saying, ‘Perhaps you could write about what happened. You might find that easier than talking about it.’ Is he mad? Why would I write about it if I can’t talk about it? I mean, when you talk, the words disappear into thin air; you say them and then they’re gone. But when you write them down, they’re solid, on the page, there for ever. I couldn’t do that. So when he tried to hand me a thick, spiral-bound, hardback notebook, I sat on my hands.
