There was no way for Lesley to know how long he’d been out. He woke up in a dark room, the side of his head inflamed and pulsing. It seemed he’d been crying in his sleep, as his cheeks were streaked with wet and his eye sockets were welling up with salty fluid that stung his eyes.

He cried out, not with words but a keening wail that bounced back at him against tin sheets very far away from him. When he realized the lights weren’t out, but he was blindfolded, he tried to pull it away and discovered his flabby arms were pinned to his sides. “Oh fuck,” he tried to say, but his jaw wasn’t working and his lips were puffy and slack. As a matter of fact, it hurt to even try to speak at all, and pain lanced throughout the lower half of his face. “Goddamn it, goddamn it,” he cried in response, which was stupid.