Nose to nose, mouth to mouth, we shared one breath. Naked, this would be the most intimate position two people could share. She pushed herself upright and looked down at me, her pet turtle. “Why did you do it?” she asked.

My mind had never been so empty. “Do? Do, what?” I was surprised to muster a single syllable, much less two.

“Stop acting like you’re surprised by all this. You had fair warning. I should know.”

Solomon’s book, had to be. She was right, it was time to stop playing coy. “This didn’t happen in the book I read. Forgive me if I’m caught a little off guard. So, Solomon’s behind all this?”

She seemed puzzled. “I don’t know a Solomon.”

I leaned back and looked at my brains in the mirror above. “This is crazy.” I was stating the obvious, which was just as well. I could see no way of talking my way out of my predicament. “Can’t you just…please, just help me?”

“Absolutely.” She smiled and it was patently adorable. Plump cheeks, cleft chin, dimples. I couldn’t wait to rearrange her features with my fist. “That’s what I’m here for.”

My exposed brain was pulsating in the carnival mirror, oozing blood. “You’re the fucking cavalry? Fuck.”

“I’m your only chance of getting out of here.”

“Which is where?”

She giggled remorsefully. “A place I call Fucksville.”

Mandy-Marie pressed down on my chest and gave a silent look that meant, ‘Be nice, don’t move.’ I nodded, and she swung her leg off of me to stand beside the table again. I noticed the nametag for the first time: Malia. I had yet to see her blink.

“You’re in the manifestation of a maniac’s imagination. One who has been stalking you for months. Exploring your history, studying your psychology. Learning your fears and discovering your regrets. But you know this already. You know what’s in store. Fun, huh?”

I didn’t cry the night Rox fell from his crib, I didn’t know how. I felt like crying now. “This can’t be real. What’s the point of putting me through this? Please, cut the bullshit.”

She slapped my face with a stinging hand that turned my cheek to ice. “I’m the one truth in a house of lies.”

There was nothing fake about the sharp pain her slap left behind. “I’m going to fucking kill you guys.”

She nodded. “I wish you would. How else will it end?”