Daddy loves you, honey.

Her radio crackled to life and she jumped in surprise. The frantic voice was chattering about a woman apprehended who’d…eaten someone. Lola’s stomach dropped into her socks.

The voice called for backup, mentioned needing EMS for a bite to his leg.

Lola cut the radio off. She felt like she needed silence for some reason. Even though she knew the fat man was dead, that she drilled a bullet straight through him, she felt like he could hear her outside of his house. That he would come stumbling out, chewing on a mouthful of his wife.

Or am I scared that Daddy will come out?

The butterflies in her stomach became yellow jackets as she took quivering steps up the driveway, avoiding the blood, and toward the door.

She could smell her father’s bed sores again. It’s all in my head. She’d always known it was, but it didn’t take away from the dread filling her stomach like a clogged sink. Her police-issued .40-calibur Smith and Wesson was back in evidence, but she brought along her own 9 mm.

She was close to positive that she would find a body inside, probably stripped down to the bone. She didn’t fully understand why she didn’t bring any help along or notify anybody about her plan. Part of her felt she owed the man whose life she took. He wanted someone to check on his wife, and Lola wanted to be that person.

Now that she stood there, in front of that house, blood staining the concrete, she knew it would be a good time to call for backup. Even though she was technically off duty now, she brought her radio just for that reason. The same radio she just cut off.

She was a ten year old girl again. Standing in front of her father’s house. The house of her broken childhood. Filled to the brim with bad memories, seeping out through the open door. Sweat trickled down her chest and back.

Come inside, sweetheart. Daddy has a surprise for you. It’s right here, under the sheets.

“No. Y-you leave me alone. Don’t t-touch me.” She caught herself speaking out loud, then shrunk into herself and crumbled onto the driveway. Arms wrapped around knees and she rocked herself, humming a song that she didn’t know the title to. She didn’t know why she knew the tune, but always sang it to herself when she was afraid. Which meant, as a child, she sang it a lot. Maybe my mother used to sing it to me, she thought. Maybe she used to sing it to me when I was little, when I was scared. To soothe me. To make the monsters go away.

Festering memories crawled from her subconscious, memories she thought she’d buried beneath an ocean of alcohol, memories she’d beaten flat with endless workouts. She promised herself to never become that frightened little girl again. But they came back like zombies clawing their way up from the center of the Earth.