Short Story Collection

Sleep Well, Papa

Papa came to me in a dream. He said the first time was in the bathroom. He was washing me.

"Why?" I asked.

"I don't know," he said. "You were so little, so sweet. I started kissing you between the legs. You liked it."

He said the other time I saw him running out of the bedroom, naked, erect.

I said, "Why are you telling me this? It's disgusting."

He laughed and said, "What's so disgusting about it. Look."

"I don't want to," I said.

I woke up.

He came again, and he wouldn't let me go. He said, "I want to show you," and dragged me with him to the bed. We struggled, and I lost.

My alarm started ringing.

I jerked awake and sat and breathed for a long time. The sheets were soaked.

I didn't go to work that day.

That night I set the alarm an hour back.

He showed up the moment I closed my eyes. "You like seeing me. That's why you keep coming."

"Leave me alone," I said. "I need sleep. I didn't come here to see you. I don't want to see you."

"Tough luck," he said.

He dragged me in an outhouse. It was dark and it stunk, and he suspended me over the hole and asked, "Are you scared?"

"Let go of me."

I thrashed. He was stronger. He pulled off my pajama bottoms and pushed me in the hole. The chilly air goosed my buttocks. I sunk in halfway.

"You know what you have to do," he said.

"I don't care."

"Oh, yes you do. How about this?" He pressed on my head.

"Don't."

"Do it."

"No."

"I said, do it!"

And I did.

I woke up gagging, fell out of my bed and retched. The vomit steamed on the carpet. It was dark, two hours before the alarm.

The next night, I didn't go to bed at all.

I drank three cups of coffee around midnight, and by four in the morning I was wide awake and grinning. I had won.

That day at work, I dozed.

He was there right away.

"Did you miss me?" he asked.

"Get out! Out!"

"I knew you'd come. It's not like you have a choice."

"I said, out. Get out of my dreams!"

"They're your dreams, aren't they? It means you want me in them."

I stumbled home that night and fell asleep while eating dinner, my head on the table.

He didn't even talk to me. He stripped me, shoved me in his car. It was freezing. I hugged myself. My teeth chattered like crazy.

"Where are you taking me?"

"You'll see."

There was nothing to see. Only the dark and the white below it. Snow.

"Papa?"

"Be quiet."

"You can't keep me forever, you know."