The Date: An unputdownable psychological thriller with a breathtaking twist by Louise Jensen Page B

head as she stretches for a shortbread. ‘Or that reiki thing. Healing coming out of hands. Please.’ She leans back, her gaze challenging as she crunches her biscuit, but Mr Henderson’s response is calm and measured.
    ‘I can’t speak for other therapies,or other therapists, but hypnotherapy is a very powerful tool when used correctly. There are hundreds of research studies demonstrating the effects. I can show you some reports if you’d like?’ He addresses Jules, not me, and I think how patient he is. How kind. It’s not like this is her session.
    ‘It’s okay. I can see you believe it.’ Jules sweeps crumbs from her lap. ‘So you just do what?A session, and Ali is magically better? She’ll remember what happened and recognise faces again?’
    ‘Unfortunately, Ali has sustained damage to the temporal lobe of the brain and hypnosis can’t repair that. I can’t help with facial recognition. But for the memory loss there’s no telling at this stage how many sessions Ali might need. Brains are like fingerprints, they’re all unique and everybodyresponds differently. Amnesia is a complex psychological condition. In localised amnesia, which is what you are suffering from, Ali, you’re unable to recall the events of that night; although the memories are still in there somewhere, it’s a matter of finding them.’
    ‘But I will remember?’
    ‘Possibly. You could remember today, next week, next year or perhaps never. Often, when we experiencesomething so shocking that our mind cannot process it, we either blank things out entirely or pretend they never happened by doing something completely normal.’
    ‘This isn’t normal,’ Jules mutters loud enough to be heard.
    ‘What do you mean, “normal”?’ I’m trying to equate everything he says with my own experiences.
    ‘For instance, there was a case where a woman, after yearsof domestic abuse, killed her husband, and her children, but rather than killing herself she cooked them a meal, as though nothing had happened.’
    ‘That can’t be true.’ I am horrified. How can you not know you’ve murdered your entire family?
    ‘Her mum called round and caught her stepping over bodies to lay the table, the walls splattered with blood. She had no conscious recollectionof any of it. You were at a bar?’
    ‘Yes. Prism.’ I try to push away the image of that woman, her poor children, what she must have gone through to have snapped like that?
    ‘It’s very possible going back to the bar could trigger your memories, or hearing a song that was playing that night, smelling the same perfume someone was wearing, tasting the same drink. We’re often transportedback to certain events through our senses. The smell of cinnamon, for example, always reminds me of the Christmas cake Jeannie used to make. We’d throw in a five pence piece and make a wish.’
    There’s a wistful expression on his face and I wonder whether he is recalling his children, wondering what they wished for, wondering if they came true.
    ‘Coconut always reminds me of the beach,’Jules chips in. ‘Suntan cream.’
    All at once it’s as if I can hear the shrieking of gulls. The fabric of the picnic blanket against my skin as we’d lain on the clifftops, outside the crumbling cottage, Matt’s hands on my body, firmly massaging lotion into my shoulders, my breastbone which always burns, dipping into my bikini top, brushing my nipples.
    ‘Ali? Are you okay?’
    Jules’svoice jolts me back to now, my face as blazing hot as the sun I’d imagined I was lying under.
    ‘Is it dangerous?’ I ask. If one simple trigger can make me recall, so vividly, the feel of Matt’s skin on mine, do I really want to be back in that night? Fingertips bruising my arms, tights torn. My throat raw from screaming.
    ‘No. There has never been a credible report of anyone beingharmed through hypnosis. You’re the one in control. You won’t do anything you don’t want to do, and you won’t remember anything