Mr. Sandman was assuming that I was in the bathroom. In another minute he would come seek me. Quickly I shut the album, returned it to its place on the crammed shelf, shut the door.

Heart thudding in my chest. Such violence, like a fist punching my ribs.

None of the girls I’d recognized. My predecessors.

“Vio-let, dear. Come here at once.”

ALREADY FORGETTING HOW IN SOME OF THE PHOTOGRAPHS, THE camera was close, intimate. Bruised mouth, open. The silk robe had been pulled open, or tossed away. Small pale breasts with soft nipples. The curve of a belly, a downy patch between legs.

In one, a girl with opened, dilated eyes. A look of fear. A smear of blood on her face. Hands not clasped on her chest in that attitude of exquisite peace but uplifted as if pushing away the camera.

But already forgetting. Forgotten. The ugliest sights.

Unless it was myself I’d seen, confused with another.

What had he done to this girl? Stared and stared.

She’d failed to fall asleep properly. She’d been stubborn, resistant.

Or, he had not drugged this girl because he had not wanted her to sleep. He had wanted her awake, conscious.

But why was this? Why was one girl treated differently from the others?

You are that girl, you wish to think. Always, you are different from the others.

NOT TRUE THAT ALL TIMES WERE THE SAME TIME. FOR THERE WAS the last time in Mr. Sandman’s house that would not be repeated.

Inadvertently he’d given me an overdose. A fraction of a teaspoon of fine-ground barbiturate dissolved into sweet blueberry juice but he’d miscalculated, or he’d become complacent over the months. For so obediently the stupor came upon me, each time a mimicry of the time before, his vigilance had diminished.

And then, Mr. Sandman couldn’t wake me.

Vio-let! Vio-let! Wake up, dear . . .

No memory of falling asleep. Only vaguely, something in my hand that had to be taken from my fingers to prevent its spilling.

A terrible heaviness. Sinking downward. Surface of the water far overhead, no agitation of my numbed limbs could bring me to it. Comfort in the dark cloudy water like many tongues licking together.

Violet! Open your eyes, try to sit up—the voice came from a distance, alarmed.

Shaking me, and shaking me. Bruising my shoulders with his hard fingers, naked inside the silk robe. My skin still warm from the bath, not yet beginning to cool into the chill of death. Slick creamy lotion caressed into my skin, smelling of lilac. Talcum powder on all the parts of my body that would be covered by my clothes, when I was clothed again.

Except: he could not wake me.

Did not dare call 911 (Mr. Sandman would confess) for then he’d be discovered, arrested. His secret life exposed.

Yet, he did not want the girl to die.