I told him to let go of my arm.

Instead he tightened his grip and began walking toward the cellar stairs, drawing my weight along with him as though I were a piece of loose luggage, past the corner, his leather shoes silent on the runner.

I am not going to turn what happened on those stairs into a scene for anyone to watch.

It is enough to say that he put me down in the old wine cellar, the thick oak door with its rusted iron strapping set deep into the foundation, and that he told me I needed to learn where my boundaries were, and that the iron bolt slid into place with a heavy hollow thud, followed by the rasp of a key, and then the distant click of the basement door locking at the top of the stairs.

The darkness was total, the kind that makes your eyes strain for shapes that are not there.