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Prologue
Thirty-one years ago, .
. .
Daddy!
The cry for help stayed locked
inside because her throat was so hard and tight she couldn't even make a
whimper.
She didn't know how long
she'd been so scared she could hardly breathe, cuz she was just learnin' to
tell time. Besides, it was too dark to even see a clock. But it seemed like
the door had closed with that weird click noise and all the light went away
forever ago.
And still her daddy
hadn't come for her.
She breathed through her
mouth, like she had to every time Daddy took her to the locker room after a
football game. Those big boys smelled just awful after a game! This dark
and very cold place smelled just awful, too.
She was so cold she
shivered and her teeth clicked and clacked. Sometimes, she thought she
heard her friends laughing. Mostly, she couldn't hear nothin' but her loud
mouth breathin' and her teeth clacking.
She didn't know what
she'd done wrong. She'd been playing checkers with her friend, Tank, and
had to go to the bathroom. She'd washed her hands, made sure the paper
towel she used to dry them stayed in the trashcan. She shut off the light.
She'd followed all the rules. She was very good at following the rules.
Everyone said she was a good little girl. But, on the way back to Tank, and
checkers, the man who never talked and only stared at the kids grabbed her
up. His big hand smashed her mouth shut as he ran up the creaky old stairs.
Someone called for him.
He growled, then made her face look at his. "Don't 'cha make one
sound, missy," he hissed. "Not one." He shoved her through a
doorway, into blackness and shut the door.
She huddled against a
wall and waited for her punishment to be over. For whatever she'd done
wrong, she was real sorry.
Finally, she heard a
clunk-clunk. Then, another clunk-clunk. Then another.
Footsteps! Someone was
comin' up those dark stairs where none of the kids were ever 'posed to go.
It had to be Daddy! She
blinked her stingy, wet eyes and stared real hard at the place where she
thought the door would be. Her daddy would come for her. He would! He'd
open that scary door and scoop her up in his strong arms. She knew for sure
that her Daddy had the strongest arms of all Daddy's. She knew it and felt
real proud cuz of it. He'd spin her round and round 'tiI she was dizzy and
squealing with giggles. He'd laugh his giant laugh and give her a fuzzy
wuzzy bear hug. He'd kiss the top of her head and tell her she smelled sooo
good, and that he'd missed her every minute of the day. She'd bug him about
having cheese pizza for dinner. Or chocolate milk shakes. He'd laugh some
more and talk about green beans and pork chops or yucky brussels sprouts
and ham. Everything would be okay. It would. It had to be okay cuz she'd
been praying for it to be okay as hard and fast as she could pray.
The doorknob made that
click sound it made after the bad man shoved her in the dark, dark, dark
room forever ago.
Daddy! She almost
giggled out loud because she was so excited to see him. To feel safe. To go
home to her warm, pink and white bedroom and snuggle under the special
quilt mommy made for her before she'd got sick enough she had to go to
heaven. She'd say her prayers and thank God so much for bringing her daddy
to her. Then, she'd go to sleep while her daddy read her a pretty story
where everything was always, always okay.
The door opened squeak
by squeak.
She wanted to get up and
run to her daddy. Really, she wanted to. Really, really. But none of her
parts would work. She sat there, in a tiny knot on the cold floor and
waited for her daddy to pick her up and carry her back to the light, back
to where the other kids, her friends, were playing and laughing and having
fun.
"Hello Missy."
The rough voice and the
skinny shadow it came from did not belong to her daddy!
Oh God! Please help me!
I need my daddy!
She 'membered Daddy said
it was okay to bite or kick or scratch someone if they were hurting her. Or
even scaring her real bad. And she was real bad scared right now.
All sudden like, she
moved. She didn't know what she was gonna do 'til the top of her head hit
the skinny man's private part.
He grabbed a big hunk of
her curly hair in his hard hand and yanked on it. He growled bad words at
her that people shouldn't ought to say—'specially in front of kids.
She screamed as loud as
she could, cuz that was a rule she knew. You had to scream so people'd know
when you were so scared you could hardly breathe. Then, she bit his leg
even harder than she'd bit that mean old dentist the first time he'd stuck
his fingers in her mouth.
The bad man howled like
dogs do sometimes.
Lightening hit right in
front of her eyes.
Everything went real
dark and got real quiet and she didn't know about anything else for a real
long time.
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