Strangers In The Night
The guy locked up in our basement is bad. He has to be.
The only men who end up in our basement are the bad ones. That’s what my father tells me.
I only didn’t believe him once—after one of his half-deads begged me to help him while I was delivering his daily meal. I’d burst into the living room where Daddy and Mama were snuggled up on the couch, drinking whiskey and guffawing over an episode of Everybody Loves Raymond, and I’d actually dared to challenge him. Because the half-dead had a family. Teenage daughters and a wife and a mother with cancer, who all depended on him.
“C’mere, Bel,” Daddy had said, turning off the TV and patting the seat beside him on the couch. Then he’d told Mama to bring him his laptop.
“Danny, that’s too much. She’s too young to be loo
