Chapter 3 - The Cellar Door
“Shawn?”
The voice was thin, raspy, and barely above a whisper, but it sliced straight through my soul.
“Mom?” I choked out, the word tearing itself out of my throat.
I didn't hesitate. I threw my weight forward and bounded down the wooden stairs, my boots clattering loudly against the steps. The air grew colder, heavy with moisture and the suffocating smell of neglect.
“Shawn! Oh, God, Shawn, is that really you?”
In the dim illumination of the back corner of the cellar, behind a heavy iron security gate bolted directly into the concrete foundation, two figures sat huddled together on a thin, soiled mattress.
My knees hit the concrete floor. I scrambled across the damp ground until I reached the iron bars, gripping the cold metal with both hands.
There they were.
Mom looked twenty years older than she had twelve years ago. Her cheeks were hollow, her hair stark white and matted, and her eyes were wide with a heartbreaking mixture of disbelief and profound relief. Beside her, Dad sat slumped against the concrete wall, his face bruised and pale, his breathing shallow and rattling in his chest.
“Mom! Dad!” I cried out, reaching my hands through the bars to grasp my mother’s frail, ice-cold fingers. “What... what is this? What has she done to you?”
“She... she locked us in, son,” Dad whispered, coughing weakly and pressing a hand to his ribs. “Ever since the house was put in her name... she wanted to sell the property to the developer from Pittsburgh. We said no. She said we were losing our minds.”
A white-hot rage flared behind my eyes, so intense it made my vision blur. I spun around, looking up the cellar stairs toward the open doorway where Brenda stood frozen at the top, her silhouette framed by the harsh white kitchen lights.
“You did this,” I said, my voice barely audible over the ringing in my ears. “You locked our parents in a dungeon in their own home.”
Brenda shrank back into the kitchen, her hands shaking violently. “They’re old! They didn't know what they were doing! They were going to ruin everything! The developer offered half a million dollars for this land, Shawn! We could have had everything we ever wanted, but they refused to sign the deeds over!”
“You starved them?” I roared, surging back up the stairs, taking them three at a time with a terrifying, predatory speed. “You took my money every month—two thousand dollars every single month—and you kept them locked in a concrete cellar while you redecorated the living room with their blood money?”
Brenda backed away, tripping over a kitchen chair and crashing to the floor. “I had to! They wouldn't listen! I was going to move them to a nursing home after the sale went through!”
I towered over her, my hands clenched into fists so tight my knuckles turned stark white. For twelve years, I had believed I was the bad son. I had believed my absence was the greatest sin I had ever committed against my family.
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And all the while, my sister had been turning our childhood home into a prison.
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