The Lavender Center
for those who leave space for magic
The Lavender Center claimed to be an empowering sanctuary for domestic abuse and trafficking survivors. Those who suffered mentally or physically could show up at the door, bedraggled and fearful, only to leave ready to take on the world. So said the website. Lissa tried to smile at the unlikely but comforting promise, but pain radiated along her jaw. He stole my smile. She prepared herself for what her mother would say about the place.
The residence’s tagline was “Holistic Healing by All Means Necessary.” But unlike most rehabilitation centers in the area, TLC did not offer psychological counseling or tech-supported treatment plans, and residents had to sign a twenty-page document that explained exactly why the therapies provided did not claim to be medicinal. Accordingly, TLC was classified as a retreat instead of a rehabilitation center, and it seemed to be targeting wealthier abuse victims as opposed to out-of-work substitute teachers like Lissa.
The reviews on Google were mixed. The most scathing said, “The owners have a clear disregard for good, Christian values,” “Devil’s work!” and “Lavender whatever is full of woo-woo. I couldn’t even make it a week before I hauled ass outta there.” The best reviews included passages such as “My entire life changed in a month, and I finally realized my true worth. Who knew that getting beat up by a shithead would lead to the best experience of my entire life,” and “I’m sixty-seven years old, and I feel like I finally have a fresh start! My life is worth fighting for.” The only neutral review read, “I broke the bank to get there, but it was worth it. I know women who aren’t flush with cash could benefit from these services.”
Lissa’s finger hovered above the call button. She imagined her mother’s response. A retired clinical psychiatrist and researcher, Pauline would not let Lissa hear the end of this. But there was no one else to call. She glanced at herself in the mirror, allowing her dark hair to cover most of her face. It almost hid the bruising.
Not long before Lissa ended up in the hospital, Trent had started insisting she join him at a church the size of an outdoor mall. He knew she wasn’t religious in that way—neither was he, as far as she knew—but the preacher was locally famous for his intense charisma and archaic messaging. During one of the sermons, after telling the congregation that the etymology of women reminds us that a woman must be the wife of a man, w/o-man, the preacher scanned the congregation and said that there were real women in the world, and there were those who were brainwashed into believing they needed to fill a man’s role; while he knew most in the congregation were true women, there were probably a few in this very room who needed to repent.
“Jesus will save you if you repent now,” he’d said. “If you don’t repent, you’ll burn. A good woman knows her place.” When Lissa stood up to leave, Trent’s face grew red and he pulled her back down, hard.
“Don’t embarrass me,” he’d said between gritted teeth. That night the two argued until Lissa heard her voice fading to nothing. A whisp. Fading to nothing had been her pattern until the docility led to a sliced jaw. Imagining her tailbone hitting the slick pew beneath her as he pulled her down that day, Lissa lifted her hand to her face and traced the raised area that was still healing from the wound. She continued scrolling through the comments. “This place is full of witchcraft” seemed better than any religious alternative.
Shortly after withdrawing all her money from a small personal account and reluctantly cashing a check for the difference from Pauline, Lissa inventoried all her things that remained in the three-story house Trent still owned, a house that she would refuse to fight for. She began shoving clothes, her father’s journals, a phone charger, a box of fruit bars, granola, and contact solution into a few bags to take off for the outskirts of Cleveland, Ohio with a $7,000 check.
Lissa had no energy, no other money, and very little hope aside from what her mother deemed a childish sort of magical thinking. With few friends at the time, thanks to her dormant life with Trent, coupled with the pandemic, she wished she still had people to call, to vent to. Though she’d pressed charges, and Trent had been arrested without question, his family was well off enough that Lissa worried he’d make bail, and she couldn’t be anywhere near the neighborhoods she knew when that happened.
“And you’re absolutely sure you don’t want to try a more traditional option, with a firmly scientific grasp on the human mind?” Pauline asked as Lissa zipped her backpack.
“Mom. I’ll call an Uber.”
“Fine, fine. It’s fine,” Pauline sighed, nudging her oversized glasses up her thin nose. “Here, let me help you.”
Two hours later, Pauline and Lissa arrived at the front door of a large mansion in the middle of the woods in a newly dirt-covered Subaru. They sat in silence for a moment before Pauline reached for her daughter’s hand. She started to say something, but Lissa interrupted, holding up her hand, “I’d like to go in by myself,” Lissa said, giving her mother a gentle kiss on the cheek. “Thank you for driving me.”
“Of course but let me get your bags out of the trunk,” Pauline said with a pained expression. “Hey, if you get panicked, remember to count backwards. Slowly. Remind yourself you are safe.”
“Thanks, Mom.”
Lissa hesitated at the front door, conscious of her fresh scars. Just as she was about to ring the doorbell, the heavy wood door opened, and she was greeted by a woman in head-to-toe white who curtsied to Lissa, and then waved to Pauline. Lissa fought the urge to glance back or decode what a curtsy might mean, worried she might be tempted to run back to the car. She felt a wave and heard the whisper-song of her great-grandmother, whose voice she hadn’t heard for years. “Yooehr mahther’s right. This is yer new start.” Lissa steadied herself, remembering her father’s words from so many years ago, allow yourself a little magic, before taking a step inside. Lissa wanted more than a little.
“Come in, my dear. Lissa, correct?” the woman said. Everything about her was gentle and soft. The house, too, was warm, and though it was large, there was a coziness to it.
“Yes.” Lissa glanced around the woman and down a long hallway that was bookended by two flights of stairs. She wanted to know the history of the house and could only imagine the spirits that must occupy it.
“You spoke with my partner, Glenda. I’m Doreen. Do you have a cellphone?”
“Glinda?” Lissa said, imagining a blonde materializing in a puffy pink dress and tall crown. She held tight to her phone.
“No, Glenda. She gets that a lot.” She nodded toward the phone.
Lissa worried Doreen would take it from her. Instead, she held out a laminated sheet of paper with a QR code that ran down TLC’s offerings, including reiki, shamanic healing, akashic record retrieval, hypnotherapy, yoga, life coaching, hydrotherapy, massage, heat therapy, therapeutic dance, somatic breathwork, and weekly treks to a salt cave to detox with a gong bath. There were also past life regressions and tuning fork sessions, which took place on a first-come, first-serve basis.
“All our residents’ rooms are this way,” she said, gesturing toward the right. “And our treatments are offered on the other side, though many of our offerings take place in the courtyard and outdoors as well. I’ll give you a tour.” Doreen’s small, soft face seemed eternally kind, as though physically unable not to smile.
“It’s beautiful,” Lissa said.
“Are you hungry?”
“Honestly, I’m exhausted. I just want to rest today,” Lissa said.
“Indeed! How about you try out the meditation room before we fully check you in? It’s a good first stop. I see you already paid the deposit online. Do you happen to have a check for the balance?”
Lissa pulled the neatly folded check out of the back pocket of her jeans and handed it to the woman. “I hope this is everything.”
“Perfect. Follow me.” They walked down the hall and past a room on the right that contained a few residents in workout clothes who were whispering, likely about Lissa, and toward a curve along the narrow hallway. The house looked large from the outside, but it felt like a maze. Lissa wondered what was upstairs. They passed multiple rooms with bright doors and muraled walls that depicted the tree of life and images of goddesses from around the world. Doreen paused at a nondescript white door. “There are different tracks you can set on the keypad here on the wall, just as there are outside all the doors. I recommend the grounding meditation for new arrivals but go with your heart. We’ll have your room ready when you’re done.” Doreen seemed to float as she led Lissa inside the all-white room with purple cushions. It was small—private but not claustrophobic. “You can leave the door cracked if you’d feel more comfortable that way. No one will bother you, but I’ll be just down the hall and to the right. Four doors down.”
Lissa nodded, wishing she could just go to her room and curl up in bed, but maybe this would help. She was willing to try anything. She closed the door gently, selected music randomly, and sat in the middle of the room, wishing she could feel something, anything. After a few minutes, she closed her eyes and prayed that she would feel some semblance of who she used to be—that anything here would work—as she focused on her breath. She still felt numb twenty minutes later, and a gentle shift in music signaled the end of the session. It was as though she’d simply lost time, and the only thing she felt was somewhat sleepier.
Doreen was waiting outside the door when Lissa emerged. “Cucumber and lemon infused,” she said, handing Lissa a glass of water. “Would you like to meet the other residents today?”
“I’d really like to turn in for the day, to be honest.” Lissa took a sip of the cool water.
“I completely understand. It’s okay to feel overwhelmed and tired when you arrive. Breakfast is at 7 a.m. I understand that’s a bit early for some, but I ask that you try your best to show up. Our goal at The Lavender Center is to help you rebuild mind, body, and spirit. Research shows that an early riser is more likely to feel a sense of accomplishment by the end of each day.”
Lissa imagined her mother questioning everything this woman said, asking for the source of the research on early risers and spending the rest of the night seeking contrary evidence, but Lissa just nodded. Doreen checked her tablet and asked, “What sound would you like to wake up to? Crickets, waves, Gregorian chanting, birdsong, classical, the gong, or …?”
“Waves. And I’m an early riser anyway—at least I used to be, before the pandemic.”
“The pandemic, yes. It impacted us all so profoundly, my dear. Now if you don’t mind, I have a welcome packet to email to you that includes a few short surveys, including food preferences. If you could fill that out before you turn in for the evening, I’d appreciate it. All the food is farm to table, and we have options for just about any allergy, but a little prep time is always nice.”
“Thank you, Doreen.” Lissa tried to smile with the half of her face that allowed it, wincing at the pain.
“Here you are,” Doreen said, extending her arm and showing the slightest hint of a hand peeking out that led the way to a two-bed room with a large window that faced a courtyard at the side of the mansion. Outside, there was a ledge big enough for Lissa to sit on, and a small pond that Doreen said was home to a particularly majestic heron. “You’ll be by yourself for a few days, then we expect another woman will be joining you. Her name is Annika. We don’t usually get check-ins with such advance notice, but everyone’s story is different.”
Lissa wasn’t exactly sure what Doreen meant, but she nodded. After Doreen left, Lissa filled out the surveys that asked about her overall contentment, anxiety levels, and belief systems. She hesitated on the food survey. Though a year ago, she wouldn’t be able to imagine giving up so much as pork, Lissa checked Pescetarian on the preference sheet and hit submit. For the first time, she wondered if it was possible to do as her mother had suggested and hit the reset button on life. That night, she slept deeper than she had in years.
