I did my best to copy it, but I grew tired and my hand began to cramp. Still, I managed all twelve times before Laura came back. She carried a tray that held two plastic bottles of juice and a covered plate of food that smelled amazing.

She set it on the foot of the bed and held her hand out for the notebook. Then she proceeded to peruse my work.

“Your penmanship is unacceptable,” she said. Then, before I figured out what was happening, she had set the juice bottles on the bed but taken the tray of food. The door locked with a click.

I sat in disbelieving silence.

No food?

But how long had it been since I’d had a real meal—one I hadn’t thrown up?

I grabbed the first juice bottle and chugged it, although sadly I didn’t appreciate the taste because my mind was stuck worrying about food. I craved the second bottle, too, but made myself save it. I might need those calories.

I sat feeling helpless, then reached for the notebook and pen and wrote the paragraph twelve more times, forming the letters as slowly and neatly as I could.

Sometime later—it was dark outside—she came back.

“I fixed my work.”

I was so hungry that my stomach had begun to growl every minute or so, with a sound like a lion yawning.

She looked it over and held out a granola bar.

“Thank you,” I said, tucking it into the waistband of my pants. “Thank you. I’m very hungry.”

She smiled. “Well, I can help you with that. I’ve brought your medicine.”

“What does it do?” I asked.

“It’s medicine,” she said, like I was an idiot. “It helps you.”

“With what?” I asked.

“Various things,” she said. “I pride myself on seeing very clearly in what ways I can personally help a person—a child, I should say—advance in his or her moral journey. Look at what I’ve done for Agatha. I’ve saved her from her own destructive instincts. I’ve made her safe. And I can do the same for you.”

She said all this in a reverent, almost prayerful voice.

“Please,” I said. “I just want to go. If you let me go, I won’t say anything.”

She looked me up and down. “No medicine tonight, then?” she said, and swooped out of the room.

The door had locked before I realized that she had taken my other juice bottle. The one I had saved so carefully.

Out of everything that had gone wrong, that was the thing that broke me. I collapsed to the floor, sobbing.

That night, the nightmares were the worst I’d ever had. I was chased down by horrific, distorted versions of my family. I awoke throwing up every last crumb of the granola bar.