1 P.M.

It takes an eternity to lose the paralyzing numbness in my limbs, but slowly and unwillingly, the pain subsides and a rough sense of clarity returns to my mind. My eyes learn to focus. On the faint cracks in the walls, the growing spot of mold in the corner, the little spider dancing its way up my fingers.

I’m in the basement of my own home. But not quite. The basement I remember was stacked to the ceiling with garbage we can’t seem to throw away, walls brown and peeling.

But I smell the walls before I notice, freshly painted chemical eggshell. It is a small room, not unlike my own. A mattress in the corner, a desk next to it. And above the wall it leans against, there’s a small narrow window. The grate paints over the room with small squares of sunlight.

And it was clean. What had been boxes after boxes of overflowing crap, the basement now left no trace of its once unruly past. I had hated this room. The place where things go to die. When I got too old for Mr. Teddy. My bike. My action figures with one head too little and arms all wrong.

I guess, now it’s my turn. What the fuck.

The only thing I recognize, is the same old staircase and the same old door it leads up to. The red basement door. It’s a stark, angry color, like fury in color-scale, and it seems to loom over the otherwise ashen room, ominous and taunting at once.

I try to stand, but it’s an impossible feat. I’m grounded by a bodily ache I cannot shake. Instead, I rest my weight on my knees, and unsteadily, step by step, I crawl up the staircase. It’s longer than it looks, because by the time I make it to the top step, my chest is on fire and I’m gasping deep helpless breaths.

I climb up slowly against the door, until my hand meets the cold metal of the door handle. A startling thought rips through my mind, brutal and cruel. They’re going to be sorry for what they did. Then I turn the handle.

But the door stays shut. I hear the shift of the bolts unlatching, but the door does not budge.. I try again, again, and again, until I press my ear against the door and I hear the muffled rattle of metal padlocks through the thick wood and something cold crawls up my spine. It’s trepidation or shock or something of the mix. I’m pulsating with an amalgamation of horror and anger and it makes my fingers shake.

They curl to a fist. “Let me out,” I say.

When there is no reply, I rattle the door handle again. “Is this some sort of sick joke,” I laugh, but a bubble of dread rises to my throat. I twist and jerk and in my wild desperation attempt to rip the handle from its installation, but only to complete and utter futility. What if they can’t hear me? Instead I bang my fist against the door and I yell, “I said let me out!”

My throat feels scorched by fire. But I grit my teeth to scream again. And again. Yet all I am met with is the echo of my own voice, harsh and strangled.

I turn the door handle again, and this time, I push with all my might. My bones strain. My muscles cramp. The door stresses against the padlock, but it leaves a slither of space between the door and the frame. Just enough to get a glimpse through the gap. Immediately, I recoil, jerking back from the door.

They’re standing behind the door. Both of them. Still as a painting. My father stares back at me. Dark blue eyes of my own, like looking into a mirror. Was it the faint smile? The crinkles in his cheeks? The lack of regard in his eyes? In an instant, my surprise morphs to a violence I’ve never known myself to possess.

I propel myself into the door. Jamming my shoulder into the hard wood. It should hurt, but it doesn’t. I’m numb all over again. And I’m screaming, untamable, unrestrained, wild screeches. “LET ME OUT LET ME OUT LET ME OUT!” I’m kicking, beating at the door, and I hear the metal rattle like my teeth.

But I would not be worthy of a response. The louder I was, the angrier, the stiller everything else was, the quieter. It drains me. My wrath sliding off my slicked skin and saturating the floor. Eventually, I hear their soft footsteps treading away from the door. And I hear my mother turn on the vacuum, her favorite song humming through the house in its sweet muted notes.

I stare at the door for some time, gasping for breath or in disbelief I will never know. My legs feel weak, my head heavy, but my chest is tight, strained by an anger that keeps me upright. Tiny splinters in the door mark my arms with littles holes, and like tiny planted seeds, they unfurl from my body in crimson lesions and red splotches; It turns my tongue poison. I close my eyes to imagine their soulless bodies still hovering behind the door. Their cruel eyes. Their hateful silence.

Then I spit at their feet.