My body went limp with hunger as I saw her little pink pajamas pad down the dusty cellar stairs. The precious child, I would soon have her life, her experiences, to hold as my own; I would know her for who she really is; I would, for a short moment, be one with her, two personalities merging into one, and then her identity would flicker and vanish, but I would have her essence; I would have her unspoiled virgin expanse, and I would not squander it as her parents and society eventually would. I would keep it fresh, eternally youthful.

Or maybe she could become mine, I could introduce her to life as I had known it. My precious Diana could become my legacy to Wilton, Pennsylvania; I could leave behind a little piece of myself, another of my kind.

Or she could become my companion, and she would call me Mistress.

Come to me, Diana, my precious.

And then she was in my arms, soft and cuddly, smelling warm and sweet from sleep, and she rubbed her fists into her eye sockets as I danced her around the floor.

“Amy!” I heard her brother call, and I shot him with a harpoon of fear that cramped his stomach. She’s mine now, you brat. You just leave her be.

We sat together at the tea-party table, she so prim and proper in her fuzzy pajamas, with sore little hands in her lap, and I drank in her smell as I smiled and lifted a tiny, empty plastic teacup in a mock toast to her health. She looked down at her hands.

“Diana, my darling, what is it? Oh, I know. I promised you a journey, and here we are in this ugly, scary cellar.” I stood up and held out my hand to her. She looked up at me with those trusting, loving eyes, and I knew I had to give her that, just that; I had to give to her the child-pleasure dream of a lifetime. Then she put her little hand in mine, and I led her to my hiding place under the stairs and she crawled in with me. I held her warm body close to mine, so close that I could feel her pulse even in her little legs, and I began to gently remove her sleepsuit as I spun her final illusion.

“Suddenly I could breathe again. It felt like I’d been tied to the chair with thick ropes around my chest, and then suddenly they disappeared.

“Will was taking great gasps, too, holding his stomach, and I knew by the look on his face that his bowel control was not quite as good as mine.