The Housemaid(65)

“Your eyes will adjust a bit,” he says. “But it won’t help much. I boarded up the window last week and put in new lights. If you turn off the light, the world will be pitch black. Turn it on and… well, those ultra-bright lightbulbs are pretty intense, huh?”

I close my eyes and see nothing but blackness. I open them, and it’s exactly the same. No difference. My breathing quickens.

“Light is a privilege, Nina,” he says. “My mother has noticed before that you failed to turn off the lights. Did you know in other countries, there are people who don’t even have electricity? And what do you do? You waste it.”

I press my palm against the door. “This is really happening, isn’t it?”

“What do you think?”

“I think you’re a crazy, sick asshole.”

Andy laughs on the other side of the door. “Maybe. But you were the one who was in a loony bin for trying to kill yourself and your daughter. The police saw you doing it. You admitted to having done it. And by the time they came here to check things out, this room looked exactly like a storage closet.”

“It was real,” I gasp. “It was real the whole time. You…”

“I wanted you to know what you’re dealing with.” His tone is amused. He finds this entertaining. “I wanted you to know what would happen if you tried to get away.”

“I understand.” I clear my throat. “I swear to you, I won’t leave. Just let me out of here.”

“Not yet. First you have to be disciplined for wasting electricity.”

The sound of those words brings back an overwhelming feeling of déjà vu. I feel like I’m going to throw up. I sink to my knees.

“So here’s how it’s going to work, Nina,” he says. “Because I am such a nice guy, I’m giving you two choices. You can have the lightbulb or you can have blackness. It’s entirely up to you.”

“Andy, please…”

“Good night, Nina. We’ll talk more tomorrow.”

“Please! Andy, don’t do this!”

Tears spring to my eyes as his footsteps fade away. Shouting won’t make a difference. I know it because this exact same thing happened to me one year ago. He locked me in here the same way he has today.

And somehow I’ve let him do it again.

I imagine things unfolding the same way as last time. Emerging from this room, weak and groggy. Him making it seem like I was trying to hurt myself, or worse, hurt Cecelia. Everyone will be so quick to believe his story after the last time. I imagine being wrenched away from my daughter again. I just got her back. I can’t let that happen. I can’t.

I’ll do anything.



Once again, Andy has left three water bottles for me in the refrigerator. I decide to save them for the next day, because it’s all I’ll get and I have no idea how long I’ll be in here. I’m going to save them for when I can’t stand it another minute. When my tongue starts to feel like it’s made of sandpaper.

The light situation is driving me completely crazy. There are two naked bulbs on the ceiling, and both of them are these ultra-bright lights. If I turn on the light, it is agonizingly bright in here. But with them off, it’s pitch black. I get the idea to push the dresser over below the lightbulbs, and I climb up there and manage to unscrew one of them. It’s a little better with just the single lightbulb, but still bright enough that I have to squint.

Andy doesn’t come back in the morning either. I sit in that room the entire day, worrying about Cecelia, wondering what the hell I’m going to do when and if I get out of here. But this isn’t a delusion. This isn’t a hallucination. This is really happening to me.

I have to remember that.

It’s bedtime when I finally hear footsteps outside the room. I’ve been lying in the bed, choosing the darkness option. When it was daylight, a few tiny cracks of sunlight had gotten through, and I could almost make out the shadow of objects in the room. But now that the sun has gone down, it’s pitch black again.

“Nina?”

I open my mouth but my throat is too dry to say anything. I have to clear my throat. “I’m here.”

“I’m going to let you out.”

I wait for him to add “but not yet,” but he doesn’t.

“But first,” he says, “there are going to be some ground rules.”

“Anything you say.” Just please let me out of here.

“For starters, you don’t tell anyone what went on in this room.” His voice is firm. “You don’t tell your friends, you don’t tell your doctor, you don’t tell anyone. Because nobody will believe you, and if you talk about it, it’s just going to be a sign that you’re having delusions again and poor Cecelia could be in danger.”

I stare into the blackness. Even though I knew what he was going to say, hearing it fills me with fury. How can he expect me not to talk about what he just did to me?

“Do you understand, Nina?”

“Yes,” I manage.

“Good.” I can almost imagine his satisfied smirk. “Second, from time to time, if you need to be disciplined, that will take place in this room.”

Is he kidding me? “No way. Forget it.”

“I don’t think you’re in a position to negotiate, Nina.” He snorts. “I’m just telling you how it’s going to be. You are my wife now, and I have very specific expectations. Really, it’s for your own good. I taught you a valuable lesson about wasting electricity, didn’t I?”