The attack, when it came, was brutally swift and silent. He heard only a swish of something falling through air, and had the chance to look up just as a terrible weight came crashing down on his shoulders. His knees buckled and he fell to the ground, pain lancing through his back. His legs wouldn’t move anymore, and something warm and wet ran over his body. He tried to cry out, but quickly descended into blackness.

When Pete came to, he was upside down and hanging from his feet from a rough-hewn beam in the ceiling, some kind of rope cutting cruelly into the flesh of his shins. His pulse thundered in his ears, and the pressure made his head scream, his vision tinged with pink. It took him a few moments to remember what had happened: the blood and finding the tarp and the dead bear, and then something falling on him…

A horrible smell assaulted his senses and he gagged. He tried to pull himself up, but his legs wouldn’t work properly at all. Panic flooded through him and he tasted metal in the back of his throat. He had no idea where he was or what was coming next.

He realized something else: he was naked.

Jerri, I’m sorry, please do something call someone please help me…

He sobbed aloud, and it was very loud in the quiet room. He heard the sound of a slow, steady dripping. What was happening? Who had put him here, and why had they taken away his clothes? WWJD, should have listened to her in the first place and I wouldn’t be here I’d be home drinking a beer in front of the ball game and waiting for dinner oh God please, please help me.

He was being punished for his sins; he had not been a good husband or a man; he had not gone to church or worked with those less privileged or donated money to good causes. He was lazy and a drunk and he had no friends except Dana and even he wasn’t really a friend at all, but an acquaintance. His sister lived a thousand miles away and he didn’t visit his mother in the home or own a dog and he didn’t eat well or give out candy on Halloween to all the kids in their costumes—

Somewhere, the sound of a door opening. Pete Winegold realized two things in the ensuing silence of the room: everything he thought he knew about his life was wrong, and he did not want to die.

“Hello?” he said. He tried to twist around to see what had come in behind him. His entire body began to shake. “Whatever you want, you got it. I—I got a truck, it’s parked down the road, it’s almost new, you—you can have it. I got a couple thousand in the bank too.”