“Keep stuffing that slop into your mouth!” she barked without pity.
Hopelessly and desperate that she not strike me again, I resumed eating while my tears fell into the plastic dish. When I was finished, she took the spoon from my trembling, gloved fingers and removed the dish. A moment later, she returned and unlocked my nose leash but continued to hold it.
“Up!” she hissed, putting tension on the chain.
I howled with misery from the insistent pain, slowly struggling to my feet, and then stood trembling before her, unable to look anywhere else but along the line of links to her gloved hand, then into her face, hating the thing that controlled me so intimately and surely. Babs smiled sweetly.
“Come along! It’s time for you to be hung up in your nice swing.”
She turned and walked slowl
