Ice & Prejudice

Chapter 24

Ria's POV:

The lecture had been going on for at least half an hour, but I had barely absorbed any of it. The droning hum of Professor Bakshi's voice was both soothing and unsettling, the steady cadence of his words a stark contrast to the chaos in my mind. I'd chosen my usual seat in the back corner of the room, trying to hide behind my laptop as if it could shield me from everything swirling in my head.

"... dissociative amnesia, a fascinating and complex condition where an individual is unable to recall critical autobiographical information, usually following a traumatic event," Professor Bakshi explained, his voice rising slightly to emphasize the importance of his words.

I felt a shiver run through me as he continued, but it wasn't from the chill in the room. It was from the dark memories that clung to the edges of my consciousness, threatening to pull me under. The date on the calendar mocked me—October 30th, Devil's Night. I couldn't ignore it, no matter how hard I tried. Tomorrow marked three years since that night. Three years of trying to push the memories away, but they always crept back in, stronger and more vivid than before.

"... not just simple forgetfulness," Professor Bakshi was saying. "Dissociative amnesia is a psychological defense mechanism. The mind protects itself by burying memories that are too painful to confront. In some cases, entire chunks of a person's life can be lost, only to resurface years later, often triggered by something seemingly insignificant. A scent, a sound, a color, a person. Anything, really."

My heart pounded in my chest, and I pressed my palms against my thighs, trying to ground myself. My mind had been in a fog all week, the nightmares becoming more frequent, more intense. Last night, I'd dreamt of it all again. The assault, the terror, the helplessness—I could feel everything as if it were happening in that very moment. I woke up gasping for breath, my heart racing, and the darkness of my room closing in on me.

Now, sitting here, I couldn't escape the feeling that something was off. My memories were clear—I had always been sure of that. But the more Professor Bakshi talked, the more I began to doubt myself.

"Repressed memories are a related phenomenon," he went on, his voice calm but firm. "These are memories that have been unconsciously blocked due to their association with a high level of stress or trauma. They can remain hidden for years, often only coming to light through therapy or in response to a trigger."

I stared at the screen of my laptop, but the words blurred together, incomprehensible. Repressed memories. Buried deep within the subconscious, only to resurface later. Was that what was happening to me? Were the nightmares just my mind's way of trying to bring something back to the surface? Or was it the opposite? Was my mind trying to twist what really happened, reshaping it into something it wasn't?

"Sometimes," Professor Bakshi continued, pacing slowly in front of the class, "the mind can create false memories or alter existing ones as a form of self-protection. It's a way of coping with trauma by reshaping reality into something more manageable."

A wave of nausea rolled through me. False memories? My chest tightened as if a vice was closing around my heart. What if everything I thought I remembered was wrong? What if my mind had twisted the truth, warping it into something that wasn't real? The assault had always been so clear in my mind, but what if I was wrong? What if I'd been wrong this whole time?

I could feel the panic rising, my breath coming in short, shallow gasps. I tried to calm myself, but the thoughts kept coming, relentless and overwhelming. If my memories were false, what did that mean for everything that had happened since? The court? The trials? For everything I'd done to try to move on? Was Vlad actually innocent? Was I the bad guy all along? Had it all been for nothing?