Telepathic Heroines

TELEPATHIC HEROINES

BY GENEVIEVE LYNN HARPER

Copyright © 2026 GENEVIEVE LYNN HARPER All Rights Reserved.

No content of this book whatsoever may be copied, excerpted, replicated, or shared without permission from the author.

Published by ISBN

At the Redwood Agency, on the Dakota reservation in Morton Minnesota next to an 1861 stone warehouse, upholding a series of mills, schools, and one hub for providing good and services for Dakota, and trading post, a Dakota man named Wakondayamanne Iron Shields gulps down the caseloads of rum ruthlessly spilling it on himself like a wild man in exchange for currency that the American colonist began counting consumed by greed.

Wakondayamanne counted the currency and noticed it wasn’t sufficient. “Sir, you told me three times this amount!”

“Damn heathen I gave you enough money. My crew will only take the bear fur in exchange for the rum. Better be off these lands by morning crazy Indian.”

Wakondayamanne replied, “I won’t listen to your words. They’re filled with lies. Leave this place, take the bear fur, but don’t lie to me. A deal is a deal. I demand the money you owe me.”

“I’ll demand you to be silent. All an Indian needs is a bottle of rum. Better be off these lands, clear, the land, till the soil, and continue the steady flow of fur trade. Better life be gone without you. All a man like you needs is a good beating. Skin for skin. Flesh for flesh.”

Wakondayamanne thought to himself, is this a line from the Bible where the Devil with God’s permission decides to inflict terrible boils on Job?

“Who are you the white devil in flesh?”

“No, you half breed, I’m the law. You get out of here and take your rum with you.” The colonist said scoffing at Wakondayamanne and grabbing the money. Then lifting the fur just bought from Wakondayamanne over his back, he walked out of the tavern. Wakondayamanne was a young half breed Dakota man eager at the age eighteen to make a living and a life in the white man’s world out in Morton, Minnesota.

One day in 1889, a Mdewakanton Dakota shaman n

amed Chief Iron Shields gazed at the sky in White Bear Lake, Minnesota near some sand dunes with growing excitement. An eclipse of the sun had suddenly darkened the land. From Wovoka a Paiute prophet in a form called intuitive telepathy the following languages was decoded into the Siouan language to Chief Iron Shields: Translated this message in English declared; LANDS TO BE RESTORED TO DAKOTA TRIBE. DAKOTA PEOPLE TO BE FREED FROM WHITE MAN’S RESERVATIONS. Wovoka visualized a mysterious power, a great carpet that would roll up the white man and conceal all his works.

Wovoka saw his tribe dancing to invoke this power and words of promise, all chanting to the dead. Thus, this mysterious power led the two men to develop insight, specifically, intuitive telepathy and transfer it to other and their descendants.

Soon I, Renee Iron Shields(born Margaret Lafayette) would share this intuitive telepathy with another person who needed vital information. In time, I would use it in my career as a police detective.

Wakondayamanne passed this telepathy onto me as well to generations and descendants of the Lafayette family. Hapistina, my beloved ancestor and heroine and her father, Chief Iron Shields could foresee their families being slain in their sleep during the Dakota Uprising of 1862.

Wakondatamanne’s tribe, the Mdewakanton, sometimes fled lands defeating the colonists through fighting to save their tribe and lands from being taken. Heroic and seen as extraordinary, they possessed the ability and bravery to rescue their families from various forms of abuse and torture.

They faced injustice and so had I through bullying in high school, my neighborhood in Houghlin, NY, school and community. Did their torture and injustice lead to my own? What did my nemesis have in store for me? Was it the same torture enacted by the colonists to the natives out west in states like Minnesota and South Dakota during the mid-1800’s?

Dakota tribe families slaughtered while sleeping. Chief’s of tribes head cut off. Did their madness lead to my own? Is that why I suffered from anxiety? Their frantic faces had become mine.

Wakondayammne has suffered his own injustice through trade, starvation, racism, and tough living conditions. His uncle, Francois Lafayette was a French fur trader, who lived near the sand dunes with his wife, Hapistina Iron Shields. At a young age Wakondayaamanne’s aunt, Hapistina understood what life was like a Dakota girl on a white man’s land in Winowa, Minnesota. Starvation and horrible work conditions. Fighting to stay alive and off the white man’s land.

Growing up as a Dakota native American girl in the 1800s life out in White Bear Lake, Minnesota life was scary and violent for Hapistina. Starvation was common. When Hapistina married Francois her life became more complex with violence, betrayal from the white man, and false promises from the US. government. In 1862, Philip’s father owned a store at the Lower Sioux Agency across the river from Morton, MN. Philip and his family lived in the store. The summer of 1862 was very hot. It was the 2nd year in a row that the Indian’s crops had failed. On the morning of August 18, 1862, an old Indian by the name of Iron Shields went about warning the whites to flee. Francois was shot and killed that day in the store and his family was taken to Fort Snelling.

His uncle Francois Lafayette was a French fur trader, who lived near the sand dunes with his wife Hapistina Iron Shields. At a young age Wakondayaamanne’s aunt Hapistina understood what life was like a Dakota girl on a white man’s land in Winowa, Minnesota. Starvation and horrible work conditions. Fighting to stay alive and off the white man’s land. After their family was exiled from their Minnesota River Valley homelands they established a new community in St. Paul, Minnesota.

In St. Paul Francois’s grandson Philip Lafayette born 1911 faired for the better playing professional ice hockey right out of the University of Minnesota and making it to the Olympics in Germany in 1936. After winning a bronze medal and having a splendid hockey career, he moved to Alexandria, Virginia to start a family with his new wife, Katherine. Then Philip had a son named Philip Jr born in Alexandria, Virgina.

After attending Annapolis and serving valiantly in the Vietnam War as a gunfire liaison and a lieutenant commander on the US. Navy on the St. Paul Ship, Philip Jr returned to the US. and wrote a love letter to Carol, a woman he met one summer at Virginia Beach and whom he was dating before his service in Vietnam.

He wrote in the love letter, “I missed you while I was oversees fighting a war this country will never win. But your face just kept popping up in my head. It was the only thing that saved me…

I have to see you again. I can’t forget you; your soul and beauty are unique, not like any girl I’ve dated, and there’ve only been a few. Truth is I’ve always been detached. Never loved anyone. Until you. I hear you’re working in Denver. Let’s agree to meet up some time.” Love Phil.

They reunited in Denver, Colorado and married in her hometown of Richmond, Virginia on May 18th, 1970. In 1975, they moved to Bergen County, New Jersey and started a family. Philip became a great father and protector for his only son and twin daughters.

He told me my birth “was the happiest moment of his life.”

As a father, he had always been there for us; particularly me; the last baby born. Born five minutes after Marybeth, weighing seven pounds, I was a healthy weight for a baby unexpected.

When the doctor declared, “Wait there’s another head,” I erupted through our mother’s caboose the last zygote from the same or different embryo because the doctor wasn’t expecting me. We never found out if we were identical or fraternal. Marybeth, the first baby was seen as frail weighing only five pounds with yellow-jaundiced skin and eyes with high levels of bilirubin.

While in New Jersey, my father grew tired of his boss, saying to him “Dick, we’re making less money than last quarter.”

“Phil I hired you as my CFO, you figure it out.”

“Damn Dick, you’re spending too much money on your goddam grand kids.”

“Is that a threat? I’ll hire three men who can take you out in a second. I can’t believe your resume. You didn’t go to those colleges.”

“Frankly Dick you can take this job and shove it.” Phil Jr said flustered and impatient with his boss. The following week, he quit the company and interviewed at a paper company mill in Houghlin, NY. A month later he received a job offer as a CFO at Algonquin Paper Company, the highest paying job of his career.

So, at age eight, we packed our bags and moved to Houghlin, New York to an upscale neighborhood residing in a colonial brick house with black shutters, a Gunite pool, a pool house, a scenic front yard, and great backyard and patio for cookouts, dinner parties, and pool parties.

Growing up as a young, vulnerable girl for Margaret Lafayette her beloved white-American descendant who suffered from OCD, depression, and the pangs of Asperger’s Syndrome during the 1990’s in Houghlin, the upstate part of New York could be challenging as well if you stood out from the rest.

Especially in a fast-paced, competitive world where wealthy, popular deviant males try to socially and sexually dominate young vulnerable girls. Girls at such a young and vulnerable age need a heroic man they can turn to.

One heroic man I looked up to was my father Philip Jr.

As I matured from an eight-year old to a sixteen year-old, my father Phil Jr, protected me from boys who had ill intentions towards me. After he became ill with pancreatic cancer brought on by the agent orange exposed to him in Vietnam, sadly he passed away.

His tragic death, erupted after a failed response to chemotherapy. Like a deafening loss deep in my soul; it cut me open wide inside. The absence of a father figure left me scarred like a hallowed piece in my heart had gone missing. Fatherless. without a dominant heroic male prototype, I was raised by my mother.

The longing need for a male confident made me throb inside. Later in life I would discover this need as I chose my career path and associates who I would work with in my future work settings.

In a world dominated by males, females need to be ready to fight for their rights against males who cross boundaries with them. Boundaries that deal with what a female will allow and not allow a male to do to them verbally, emotionally, sexually, and physically.

To perverse a female is seen as cunning and sinister in the eyes of God and the law objectifies to such acts by sexually deviant men, who find pleasure in certain heinous actions that involve the perversion of females.

My father told her in life numerous ones will be victims, but the chosen few will be heroes. Already, I felt in my teenage years that I had been a victim too many times.

One evening around 1989, my father and I are in the living room in Houghlin, New York having a father-daughter dance. My father was six-feet, thin, white but with tan browned skin like his father with French and Dakota ancestry, and dark-brown eyes and dark thick eyebrows like a Brillo pad.

In a wooden den in our house, we danced to a song on the radio called, “Runaway”, by Del Shannon, as he held me in his arms. Always feeling protected by my dad in these moments knowing I loved him, and treasured them so much filled me with glee.

“I’ll teach you how to dance”, my father said with the song on the radio shifting to a different song on an oldies radio station.

I replied, “Okay Dad.”

“My beloved Margaret I want you to know if anything ever happened to me, you’ll be taken care of.”

“Anything? What do you mean?”

Deep in thought she pondered. What is he telling me? Is he ill?

“You’re not sick are you?”

Her eyes scared with a look of fury like a deer in the headlights. My daddy sick. No!

“No, I’m just saying if… We can’t predict the future.”

“I’m old enough to know that Dad.”

“I love you very much. I want you to have confidence in life and bestow your gifts.”

“What gifts do you think I have?”

“Well, you’re a great problem solver and you’re great with people. We’ll see in school where that leads you.”

Margaret considered this. Sure, I have gifts, but when would they arise and whom would they be from? Wanting to sound agreeable she replied, “Sure father.”

Gliding me across the room he took my arms dancing back and forth in a circular motion. I felt safe and secure by his strong forearms and frame locked by my side as I

covered my face in his shoulder. After the song ended, I leaned forward to press my lips against my dad’s cheek as a sign of love and affection.

Eight-years-old, vulnerable, pristine, innocent, pretty, with mid-length, fine, light-brown hair, an oval face with dimples and high cheekbones, distinctive and soulful eyes of a dark-almond colored shape, round nose, defined lips, a 5-4 frame, a muscular and thin body, and Caucasian golden brown skin like my father; I had blossomed into an attractive yet naive girl.

Early puberty caused me to have pulsating hormones, sexual fantasies, and rising body heat. As a result, I also began to suffer premature bouts of anxiety, childhood depression, pangs of Asperger’s syndrome, causing me social awkwardness.

I was quiet and sensitive not having many friends but spending time with Marybeth, and my pets, and my nose locked in books. I knew I had gifts; I liked acting and writing; and wanted to share them with the world. I liked art and appreciated movies and books and would get fixated and obsessed with cult movies and classic forms of literature with violence and possessing an outspoken form of sexual nature.

Unbeknownst to her parents that anything was wrong with her they considered her “somewhat normal”.

They didn’t want to believe any offspring of their would have a mental health issue or disability that would be inferior to the prominent upper-class conservative, competitive town of Houghlin, New York. “Nothing wrong with my daughter” they’d say to teachers.” “She’s an athlete and a sweet, attractive girl, what would make you think otherwise?”

Until the day I turned fifteen and my Mom changed her mind about my mental-well-being. My Dad said to my Mommy, “Carol, there’s nothing wrong with our Margie. She’s just adjusting to life. My Mother responded, “Phil, she’s my daughter too. You’re not here all the time. I’m starting to see things you don’t. She just locks herself in her room and plays pretend. Has no friends except Marybeth and the animals. She lives in a dream world for Christ sakes!”

My father responded, “Maybe she could go on a vacation in the winter. Go see Aunt Angelique. She understands her better than you do.”

“Phil I understand her.”

“No, you care for her. She is different. But in a good way. Aunt Angelique knows the gifts she has. Says she has things she wants to tell her. Important things.”

So that winter I spent Christmas and New Years at Aunt Angelique’s. When I returned things went sour.

Dumb sweet girl. Kids in school, Brandywine country club, and in my neighborhood, and school administrators began calling me more and more knowing there was something wrong with me. As a result, they took turns ostracizing, labeling, and belittling me. The ailments I had found me unappealing to certain smart, good-looking, and alluring boys I developed crushes on at the Brandywine country club.

Desiring only girls with not only physical attractiveness but exceptional intelligence as well, I wasn’t dateable or someone they could ever refer to as their girlfriend. In turn, this made me empty inside. Of course, boys like them overlooked my physical beauty and charm, detesting me due to my intense sensitivity, and lack of intelligence. They were so shallow and superficial to appreciate the beauty beaming in my soul.

My ego subtracted ten points. Confidence shattered, I tried to hold on to my good-naturedness, the feelings of God’s love and the Protestant church I attended, including the love from my father, and my grandmother whose house I felt the Holy Ghost in every time I visited.

Like an ugly duckling desperate for love, I felt the absence of love trying to find it and others but never receiving it. Longing for affection from a cute boy, and a circle of girlfriends, I tried to hold on to my optimism confident that someday I would a place to belong. Despite the attributes I lacked, I made up for it with my effortless athleticism, a beautiful smile, good looks, charm, and energetic spirt, optimism, and enthusiasm.

I held onto any lingering hope or feeling of bliss before the trauma. The trauma I experienced as a teenager was dreadful. And it all started with Mitch, a sadist and number one enemy of my life. We met at the Brandywine Country Club.

His father Bruce and mother Evelyn were members who had invited my parents to the club after meeting through a well-respected realtor at Coldwell Banker in Houghlin named Fred Tomlin. My father worked for Algonquin Paper Company as a CFO and Mitch’s father was Chief of Police.

Mitch’s father and mine were tennis buddies playing a set of men’s doubles every Saturday at the tennis courts at Brandywine. One Saturday morning, after winning a men’s tennis tournament, they grabbed a cold draft at the bar at the Brandywine Club house.

My parents and Mitch’s would sip on Chardonnay’s and spend time at Fourth of July Parties at the Club House and during holiday events through the Greater Houghlin Association, a local club in town where my mother, and Mitch’s mother volunteered. Additionally, they would socialize at Christmas parties at Mitch’s parents’ house where my parents and brother only attended.

Summers before turning sixteen, I swam competitively on the Brandywine Country Club and played competitive tennis. One time I won a swimming race against a girl twice my size. Our club was close to losing the entire tournament as they were leading by ten points. After I beat the girl, we won the race, and the club showed their appreciation to me, and I received praise and admonition.

My family’s kindness one time shown through when we let Mitch house sit for us. This was not a good idea as he threw a party and trashed our house.

My parents had a talk with his parents, but it went nowhere. My innocence and vulnerability led to Mitch seeing me as easy prey. My parents and I perceived as alluring and too nice, led to his decision in adding us to his victim list.

By deciding to abuse and torture me, Mitch deceived my family and the people in Houghlin in the process. He was in fact not a good natured person who treated others with kindness.

A buffoon who liked to party, a joker, play pranks on others, specifically criminal mischief, cyberstalking, phone hacking, and home invasion, he liked to torture others, and watch their reaction. It made him feel domineering and glorified to see others suffer.

To explain him in one short description I would say, he was a sadist. In the same town he lived two blocks away from my neighborhood in East Hampshire Hills. One night during Halloween he creeped up on my lawn ready to terrify me with a Halloween mask with his friends.

I opened the curtain to my window to see him standing outside with a firecracker grinning like the deranged hoodlum that he was. He saw me and smiled trying to scare me by coming closer to the window and yelled, “BETTER LOCK YOUR DOORS”, and see my reaction like some sadist in a horror movie. Underneath his orange mask with features of a carved pumpkin, his dark-brown hair slicked back, his green eyes peered creepily underneath. In my house, I sat scared out of my wits.

Mitch apologized to me the next day calling me on the phone, saying, “It was just a joke. Look, my parents are having a July Fourth party this year and you’re invited. My friend Brett is gonna be there and he wants to be alone with you.”

Like a fool, I forgave him and agreed to go the party as I liked him and didn’t have many friends. Alone with Brett Finley! He was the hottest boy in town.

Perfect slicked brown hair and bright intense burning blue-green eyes you could get lost in a spring shower rain in. Irish and English ethnicity out of an Irish Spring soap commercial with a beautiful tan Irish boy frolicking in the outdoors or a professional tennis men’s magazine with a GQ cover of a male lookalike model. Small delicate and perfect facial structure of a boy molded out of clay.

Perfect healthy sandy brown hair. Athletic legs, torso, arms, and a farmer’s tan with honey tanned skin with a fit body and slim figure of a famous tennis player. Upper-class. Smart. A mischievous laid back yet charismatic smile full of charm.

Alone with me huh? Mitch lied. His friend would rather puke than look at me. His parent’s party served wine and hard liquor. Being drunk at his house, he led me his basement where there was a stereo playing alternative rock music.

I looked around like a lost child looking for a kiss with a boy I had a crush on like a little girl filled with butterflies and feelings of desire bursting from her chest. Ready to experience first love being a virgin and giddy like a horny school-girl/jack rabbit humming timidly yet amorously, “Hmmmm, I then asked, “So where’s Brett?”.

With a smirk and eyes full of lust gloating at my body like it was a cream popsicle he replied, “Oh he’s around, I’ll tell him to come down in a second. Like I said he wants to be alone with you. But first I want to do something with you.”

“Really? What?” I asked all curious like a puppy begging for a treat as I was young and delirious. He smiled with malice full of animalistic savage wit and replied, “So, I figured you’re probably a virgin, so I’m gonna make this easy on you. We’re going to play a game.”

“No Mitch, I might be a virgin but I’m not a dumb virgin, I want to go home, I’m not feeling well,” feeling drunk and then waking up, blurry-eyed, everything seeming hazy and suddenly I became aware of my surroundings knowing a sex act had been planned.

“This doesn’t feel right,” I said blatantly. Looking me over with a smirk, he said, “Of course it doesn’t feel right. You’re a tease and now you’ll get what you deserve.” He said pushing and pinning my arms down to the floor tying me up with hemp rope. I screamed and he taped my mouth with masking tape so I couldn’t breathe.

I inhaled deeply through my nose carefully looking afraid and squirming while my wrists were tied in knots. Then he initiated a sado-masochistic sex game; he called Houdini Blindfold.

During the game, he blindfolded me with a silky lavender blindfold, pulling down my cotton brief underwear and training bra (I had just bought the penzones had already started blossoming and were sticking out) while tying my wrists and pushing me onto a desk chair. He groped my private area. His hands on my privates, I was disgusted ready to vomit.

Squirming out of the chair and breaking free from the rope and ripping the tape from my mouth, I gasped in terror wanting to crawl into a hole as I fell to my knees throwing up on his basement floor. He laughed, “Couldn’t take it huh?” he asked laughing like a hyena blocking me from leaving his basement.

“You asked for it, you wacko.”

“No, I didn’t.”

“Sure, you did, you tease my friends all the time. Just because you’re pretty and dumb you think you can get away with it.”

I fired up inside after being called, “dumb.” Then with a surge of adrenaline in my kneecap; knowing a self-defense abuse move I’d seen in an action movie with a strong heroine, I struck him with a flat-footed kick to his groin. “You bitch,” he yelled tripping on his carpet falling to the floor grabbing his crotch with both hands as it throbbed with pain.

He hurried up on his feet throwing a piece of glass at me smashing it to pieces as I grabbed my bra and underwear hurriedly grabbing my coat, pulling it over me and scurrying out his front door with my shoes on breathing heavily with my eyes wide-open. The party was still going on but people stopped in panic hearing noise and yelling. Mitch’s mother called from the kitchen.

“Mitch honey what happened?”

“Nothing. That girl is messed up. Making up lies. I feel sorry for her.” Mitch told his mom as he came up the stairs.

“Well, you were the one who said we should invite her. I feel sorry for her too…She doesn’t have any friends.”

“I know and I can see why. It won’t happen again.”

Their voices carried on as I ran across the front steps to his porch and away from his house. Vomit covered on the front of my shirt, my hair in a mess, I ran in his front yard, and back to my house with nausea and fear. My house was in another close-knit neighborhood in the town of Houghlin. Slamming the front door shut and trying to calm down I could barely breathe gasping for air like an asthma attack.

My eyes flooded with tears streaming down; I gasped in distress. I was absent a man in the house as my brother was over at a friend’s house. I remembered my Daddy was at the hospital receiving radiation treatment for his stage four pancreatic cancer.

I wanted to tell him. I envisioned myself asking, “Daddy will you kill him for me? What he did to me? Will you see that he’s prosecuted for his crime? Margaret’s desired response: “Yes, daughter I will see that he’s punished. God will too.”

Wanting to tell my mother what happened. But I sat in silence. She was sitting down distraught with her hands shaking. I didn’t tell her what had just happened. She informed me that my father had just died at the local hospital.

Marybeth and my brother standing in the kitchen hovered over her trying to comfort her as she wept. The town pitied our family. We never saw their faces anymore just heard their voices in passing in the town at the grocery store, library, or church. “I feel sorry for them. It’s just too bad. They used to have it all.”

“I heard Phil lost it with Dick Bernoff. The guy just dropped him like a hat. No warning or anything. Brought in three men to replace him…”

But before that another disaster had occurred. Five years ago, he had quit Algonquin Paper Company after another CEO betrayed him bringing in three competitors to take his position. The last two months Phil was working at McGinnis Family Farms as a CFO with his longtime friend Pat McGinnis. Phil in Pat’s office that day, paid his last respect and dues to his business partner and ally Pat McGinnis.

Tears of compassion consumed the two men as they hugged and bore each other the last amount of respect and gratitude they owed to one another.

“Thank-you Pat for taking me in. Watching my back.”

“No problem buddy. I’ll watch over your family. You have my word man.”

My father, standing next to his desk tears running down his cheek so thin and frail was on his last legs stricken by the cancer. The next week, my mother went looking for me in the upstairs part of the house. She found me in my room hibernating like a bear in wintertime detached from the world like a hermit up in a cabin in the mountains. Absent from school and missing classes, I eventually dropped out of school. My sister and brother attended classes as normal, as I spent time in my room listening to music, browsing the Internet, reading fantasy and self-help books.

Most times I’d be sleeping, and over-medicating with anti-depressants, and sleeping pills. Medicine my dad had been prescribed during the cancer. Then it was November 12th . Veterans Day. My family gathered at my father’s funeral in Arlington’s Cemetery in Annapolis, Maryland.

The Navy crew folded an American flag giving praise to my father and a live bugler played Taps. A chaplain conducted the ceremony giving a eulogy honoring my father’s service and life.

Pat McGinnis saw me, and came over, tears running down his cheeks, he hugged me, saying “Your daddy was a good man. If you need anything, I’m here.” He said wiping the tears again from his eyes and reaching out his arm to hand me his business card.

Beth standing by him walked closer wrapping her arms around me like a swan to its young. With vigor in her eyes, she said, “Margie, you’re strong, you’ll get through this. I know you. Call me. I’ll be at my grams.” she said.

Walking away with her dad Pat, both of them smiling, passing a garden bed, and gravesite, father and daughter intwined, I knew they cared. As they left in their car, I stood there though with emptiness and a black lace dress blowing on my skin with my eyes draped down and cold by the wind current.

I felt the weight of the world with tears and raccoon shades of black circles peering under my eyes. Fatherless and without a dominant male figure, I longed for a father figure’s ideals and values to follow and shape my life around.

The need for a dominant male figure lingered on making me miss the times my father hugged me in his arms, the way he held me when we danced, and when he told me he “loved me”, and that he was “proud of me.”

That Christmas, my mother was sent a letter by Langhouse Realtors.

The realtors in the town wanted our house. They came near the house in their cars, gawked at the property, and took photos. Forced to sign a contract and lend over the house and it’s land to Langhouse Realtors she surrendered. She planned to live with her mother in Richmond, Virginia. And Jared and Marybeth followed. “What did Houghlin do to you mother? You surrendered. You’re leaving Houghlin because it didn’t work out?”

Mother’s response, “I did what I had to do because you’re father died.” “That wasn’t the only reason.” I argued back.

“Did Mitch hurt you Margie?”

“How did you know that?”

“I heard from a friend what he did to his neighbor Krista Nolan. Poor girl. Can’t say who.”

“He likes to torment people Mom. He puts on a façade.”

“I know. I’ll loan you some money Margie. I’m moving out to be with my mother soon and Daddy’s sister has agreed to take you in. She lives in White Bear Lake now.”

“I know. Thanks for the money. I sure could use it.”

She handed me a check.

I took the check glancing at the envelope. After opening I saw what was inside. A check for $100,000. I would use it for college, an apartment, a car, and later a house. I couldn’t believe it. Knowing my grandmother had given me some money, made me know she loved me by leaving me in her will.

“See it’s put to good use Margie. I love you.”

My father’s death was the catalyst that led to destruction and a broken family. That and the crimes Mitch committed against me. And my dad’s falling out with his boss at Algonquin Paper Company with Carleton Hewing. Thank God for Pat McGinnis saving his career and ensuring he had a pension and 401 K.

Now my family’s destination was Richmond, Virginia. Disappointed, I wasn’t able to go, I tried to make the best of it. My destination was to live with Aunt Angelique, my dad’s sister, in White Bear Lake, Minnesota. Days ago, over the phone, she said she had a “mission for me” and in her own words it was “imperative” as she said for me to move out to White Bear Lake, Minnesota to live with her.

Hoping her promise rung true, I couldn’t wait to go live with her and escape this hell I was in.

White Bear Lake, Minnesota, I couldn’t wait to explore. Staring at myself in the mirror, I was biologically sixteen. But looking at the dark circles under my eyes, you’d think I was 40 having been through a lifetime of despair. Dispirited. Lethargic.

First I had been violated sexually. Then my father passed.

Taking a warm bath one night, noticing some old scars on my arms and legs that were either accidents, self-inflicted, and/or a result of my clumsiness as I climbed out of the tub standing in front of the mirror; I sensed the emotional scars eating deep in in my insides like someone had taken a grinder grinding my heart like pieces of fruit.

It was time that I stopped playing the role of the victim and learned to find my strengths and other mentors, or role models. It is natural and logical for humans to want to be identified as a hero and not a victim.

Multiple times after that night of attempted assault, I wanted to call the cops on Mitch but was too afraid. With his father’s exulted position in the police force, it made it an out of deck card game, and I was in in a losing streak out of cards.

He never came after me at my house after my brother had threatened him after one time when he attempted to break-in to my house.

Up pacing that night my grandmother’s spirit whispered in my ear, “Child hold on good things are coming.” With that thought, I had a new desire to survive and keep on living.

I tried to go back to bed but the nightmares kept creeping back. I wanted to write professionally and produce a memoir about my pains in life and inspire others through it sharing the pain and injustice I faced in life.

I couldn’t let Mitch get to me, and I wouldn’t let him win. No matter how much fear he instilled in me. I would hold on while longing to fly away to a foreign land where I remained safe. A place no one would know me. Somewhere I’d be free of fears and recent trauma.

It was nearly morning before nightmares of the sex game Mitch had enacted me escaped my mind.

I stayed hidden until his voice was gone from my memory. I was done. No more. Tremors in my arms made me shake back and forth I couldn’t forget the fear of Mitch’s hands on my privates. I breathed in and out slowly trying to remind I had nothing to fear. Trembling again I tried to forget his menacing voice, his scent, and the smile on his face enacting abuse on me.

Was he going to come after me? Make me go into hiding?.. Make me hide my face from the world?...

I waited a couple of hours until I was sure Aunt Angelique would be awake, since it was earlier in Minnesota. She told me, “I could come see her anytime.” I would go see her and escape this prison cell I was in. She was a safe-haven. Having visited her home in the past I knew I would be at peace once there.

Like God to a child, I felt like she had knit me in my mother’s womb. She had a kindness that could melt you to tears and make you feel the Holy Ghost. I would feel the “spirit” at her house when I’d come to visit during Thanksgiving and Christmas. She knew every ache and cry, and pain.

Muffling a sob over the phone I said, “Hi Auntie!”

“Renee! How good to hear from you! How are things going?” She heard the muffles and silence afterwards and wondered if everything was normal.

“Does your offer to come live with you still stand?”

“Oh, honey. What happened at that party. I can’t believe what you must be going through. Yes, of course. Pack a small bag for now. I’ll reserve you a seat on the next train out and reach out to your mother. She can ship whatever else you’ll need.”

I’d been holding it together all night, but at her words, I broke down crying in relief. Mitch wouldn’t know where I was once I was in White Bear Lake. He wouldn’t be able to torment me any longer. And I’d finally get a chance to explore my powers in depth. Thank God for Aunt Angelique.

My head was racing with thoughts. Could I hold it together out there? Would I have to ride back on the train and relive that torture? Hell no. There was no way. It was now or never. It had to work out. No one could live in that hell hole. Houghlin was a wonderful town. But what had taken place there had been horrific for any sixteen-year-old girl.

I had a belief in God belonging to a Protestant church. Where was God now? Was Aunt Angeliques’ house invite a blessing from God? A way to rescue me from the depths of a hallow pit Mitch had dug for me.

Aunt Angelique picked me up from the Amtrak train station service in White Bear Lake Minnesota. I was overjoyed to see her like a kid getting their first pair of training wheels for their very own bike.

I’d held it together for the whole trip, but the relief when I saw her was so huge I burst into tears. She enfolded me in her arms, like a mother swan to its young, enfolding me by her wing, cradling me so I could finally breathe calmly. People stared at me in disbelief. What’s wrong with her I could see them ask themselves their eyes lighting up in awe. Aunt Angelique and I ignored them pretending like they were invisible.

Knowing the pain, I felt having heard my voice on the phone, she had the makings of a world renowned healer. She knew the ordeals God had put me through. She knew the evils and injustices of Mitch Lancaster. She saw right through him like a discerning spirit.

Still ignoring the other travelers having to move around us, I just let myself cry it out. As I wiped the tears from my eyes, we walked out of the train station and into her Kia SUV. I swallowed with a lump in my throat.

As I enjoyed the scenic drive, the lump in my throat and sadness drifted away. This was my new home. She drove me to her huge house on a rural secluded cul-de-sac out in the countryside. Once in her doorway, I dropped my suitcase at the top of the stairs and let out a sigh. RELIEF!

Finally, finally, I was able to stop sobbing and take a deep breath.

“It’ll be okay, Margaret. You’re safe now. He can’t find you here. He’ll never bother you again.”

“Thank you so much for letting me come.”

“I’m glad to have you. You know that. Let’s get you home and settled in. You must be starving. Did they feed you on the train?”

“I couldn’t eat anything. I’m not really hungry.”

“We’ll fix that. I made some turkey club wraps. I know you love them. I learned to make them so delicately at this restaurant I worked at in my twenties. Comfort food just what you need.”

Peering around her modern high-tech house with blur shutters, an enormous greenhouse, and a nice, mowed lawn. She had an attractive hallway with Mahogony wooden stairs, and a nice blue wall-to-wall carpet that stretched all the way from her living room. In her kitchen, I noticed the scent of homemade apple crisp, with the sugared aromas of cinnamon, cut-up Gala apple slices, and Breyer’s vanilla ice-cream.

Resting my head on the stairwell for a second, and next slowly moving upstairs to my bedroom, opening the door to a single room with a bed, desk, and closet, and chest drawers. The bed, a nice antique canopy with four bedposts. Arranged on the bed were pretty frilly lace sleeping pillows with flowery designs embroidered across them.

Jumping on the bed, I sensed my knees touch the tenderness of the white sheets as pressing gently against my cheek, while landing on my side. Laying my head next to the laced pillows, nestling the fabric, I sensed a smooth texture. Home sweet home. No more nightmares tonight. I hoped.

Four hours later in the kitchen, Aunt Angelique standing by the stove adding stir fry vegetables to the rice pilaf simmering in a saucepan, and busy cooking dinner: I stepped into her eat- in- kitchen with a widespread counterspace, and granite countertops. We ate and spoke a long time before I turned in, as she played some Mozart on her grand piano.

While she played the piano, I noticed her long coal-black braided flowing hair like the superstar Cher, dark-eye-lashes, black tinted eyes with a shade of melanin, higher- positioned shoulders made for professional women’s volleyball, and 6-2 frame. I noticed her expensive clothes consisting of a black and purple leather vest with a native design in the middle, silk-taffeta leather pants, and Ugg fluff women’s slippers.

Around four in the afternoon, resting and unpacking my suitcase, I later called Marybeth in Arlington, Virginia as I missed my twin-my other half so much. “Hi Marybeth,” the words came out silently on my end.

“Hi Margaret. I miss you. When can you come see us?”

“Not for a while. Maybe on our birthday. I have to get settled in and finish high school out here.”

“I’m glad you got out of that hell hole. It’s nice in Virginia. How do you like White Bear Lake”

“It’s nice so far. Aunt Angelique has a great place.”

“I remember.” We spoke more and she told me about finishing her high school degree in Arlington and that Jared was graduating from Virginia Military Institute.

Later that night, after experiencing a nightmare about Mitch, Aunt Angelique’s puppy Lexus ran close to me comforting me by licking the right side of my face steadying herself while I leaned against my pillow. Drawing her close and kissing her face between her eyes and nose, I recalled Aunt Angelique telling me she was a yellow labrador bought from a breeder. A pup whom I soon would adopt.

I took her for walks down to the tight horse galloping track, apple orchard harvesting Gala and Honeycrisp apples, and agrihood-developed farm near Aunt Angelique’s open to the public called Shelter Point Farm. There people would pick apples and pay to see the farm animals. In a cellar, the farm would also sell donuts, cider, milk, butter, buttermilk, desserts, and baked goods.

The privately owned apple orchard was used for commercial production and sold apples. Next to the apple orchard was the barn with cows, chickens, and a stable for horses. As part of my lease to live at her house without paying rent, I would have to feed them every morning before sunrise.

I was still under my mother’s health insurance United Healthcare. That insurance paid for my visits with the psychiatrist. Out in the hallway, I filled out a questionnaire with a list of written questions. It’s ludicrous how the psychiatry field works and I should know. I’ve been in the office half my life back in Houghlin NY from age eight to sixteen. My mother would take me to them when she noticed my anxiety rising and I was late for appointments. It’s also ludicrous how in general health doctors are willing to treat a patient, but when it comes to the mind, there is no right or wrong black or white/ understanding or answer that doctors can receive.

It’s a lot of gray area and therefore more difficult and trying for a doctor who has to explain why they practice psychiatry in the first place. What does that say about what they do for a living? Then, I went in the doctor’s office and sat. While there, the doctor and I talked for almost an hour about my psychological trauma, the sexual harassment and abuse by Mitch.

“I think it’s good that you’re in a safe environment now. How are you sleeping?”

I stared downward looking at my shoes noticing the dirt on them my OCD wanted to wipe off. Cleanliness is next to Godliness right?

“I’ve been having nightmares.”

“About Mitch?”

I nodded.

“Did you see a psychiatrist back in Houghlin?”

“Yes, but they didn’t help at all. They assumed I had schizophrenia and that my condition is chronic wanting to put me on Latuda.”

The more I thought about everything that had been going on, the more my body reacted. I gripped the arms of the chair tightly to prevent my hands from shaking, hold myself in the present, but I apparently wasn’t hiding anything from Dr. Wilbins. Tremors shifted my forearms back and forth, so my grip was hard to handle objects like glasses or pens in my hands.

“You’re shaking. I can give you something to help with that.”

“No!”

He looked at me in surprise. I needed to calm down. “Sorry. They tried a couple of different medications, saying they would help, but nothing worked. And one of them caused memory loss, and I need my memory for school.”

“I understand.” Dr. Wilbins said solemnly with an empathic glance. Jotting something down on his writing pad in front of him, he stopped in thought for a minute. “I’d like to prescribe you something for anxiety called Hydroxyzine. It doesn’t have any serious side effects, and it’s easy to adjust to.”

We talked about the side effects I could expect—drowsiness, dry mouth, maybe some weakness or fatigue, and he prescribed me a low dose and asked me to make an appointment to see him next week.

He passed the script to me as I got up to leave. I knew I wouldn’t take the pills. Talking with Aunt Angelique about my telepathic powers over the last week had already helped. I wasn’t nearly as nervous anymore, and the thought of starting school next week, starting fresh, actually sounded good instead of terrifying. My telepathic powers and guidance from my ancestral spirits would be enough to keep me sane.

My diagnosis of paranoid schizophrenia was found to be something else called intuitive telepathy. I would experience intuitive telepathy with images, number of days and times, crimes, crime scenes, and victims’ and criminal’s faces, and alleged acts that were to be enacted in the future. I thought I was going “crazy” or having symptoms of schizophrenia, but Aunt Angelque told me these ideas and images would begin appearing in my dreams.

She also informed me that I would experience a new a comprehension of my powers and that their origin emerged from my ancestors, the Mdewakanton tribe.

One morning I awoke with a new understanding of these images popping in my dream. I was to rescue victims from crimes. Where I wondered? In Minnesota? Back in New York? The very thought of returning to Houghlin terrified me. But what if it was in a different part of New York?

I loved theater and the arts having done an internship one summer in Houghlin at the high school. It was a theater internship where I marketed events around a college campus. Excited that morning I told Aunt Angelique about my dreams that morning.

“So, sleep well?”

“Yes. I keep having these images invading my mind. They feel like panic attacks.”

“They’re intuitive telepathy. Our ancestors had them to know when to flee from harm’s way and to rescue others. They’ll back down once your mind adjusts to them. Just don’t tell anyone.”

“Not even Beth?”

“Maybe you can tell her. But no one else. They won’t understand. Soon you will see a man in your dreams?”

“I’m gonna fall in love?”

“No, he’s to be your partner in crime.”

“Wow. A partner, I can’t wait.”

* * *

Nightmares raced rapidly in my mind that night. As I froze in my nightmare from fear traces of sweat slid down my forehead. I awoke with a start to a puppy tongue licking the right side of my face. The bedcovers were half on the floor, my pillow nowhere to be found. I pulled Lexus onto the bed with me and hugged her close.

The yellow labrador always seemed to understand when the world was getting too much for me. Her soothing presence actually allowed me to fall asleep again. The next thing I knew, the sun was shining outside my window. No more nightmares. Thank goodness. I turned over in the bed resting in peace. Free from Mitch.

He couldn’t find me here as I turned over in the bed again getting comfortable and feeling snug. Heavenly bliss I had found as I lay my head with my arms over me with a smile on my face. Exhilaration.

Not wanting it to end. New dreams. Maybe they would point to my future? Some role I would carry out to redeem mankind. A role that would suffice my identity as a victim and heal my mind and soul. Now I awakened to a dream world of pleasantness. Endless pleasant slumber.