Gerald's Game

The child’s voice tells Jessie to go to sleep, but Ruth Neary’s voice urges her to wake up, accusing Jessie of always running away from trouble. Ruth asks what happened to Nora Callighan, Jessie’s therapist, and Jessie envisions a young girl in a pillory. She wonders what the girl did, and Ruth reveals that the girl was assaulted by a man shortly after menstruating for the first time. Jessie stopped seeing Nora because she felt uncomfortable answering questions about her childhood. Ruth notes that Jessie left the real Ruth for the same reason, as Ruth once wanted to know what happened to Jessie at Dark Score Lake when she started menstruating.

The voice of Ruth claims that she is Jessie’s only chance, and Jessie starts crying, having come close to thinking about what happened at Dark Score Lake when the “sun went out” (101). Jessie recalls going to a women’s consciousness group meeting with Ruth, at which a young woman revealed cigarette burns on her breasts from the abuse perpetrated by her brother and his friends. At the time, this revelation caused Jessie to run from the room. Ruth’s voice tells Jessie that she will need to confront her situation, and Jessie turns her attention to the glass of water that Gerald left on the shelf above the bed.