Chapter 4 - I Had Taught My Son the First Version of the Dark Game
Grant was five the first time I shut him in our old shed.
I remembered it once I stopped protecting myself from the memory.
He had knocked a bowl of soup from the table during an argument.
I was exhausted.
Working two jobs.
Angry at everything.
Instead of handling a frightened child, I carried him outside, put him in the shed, and closed the door.
Five minutes.
Maybe seven.
I told myself it was safe.
There were no dangerous tools within reach.
There was ventilation.
He could hear me nearby.
All the technical details parents use when they want to avoid naming what something really is.
Grant screamed.
Then stopped.
When I opened the door, he was quiet.
I interpreted that as success.
So I used it again.
And again.
Not constantly.
Not for years.
But enough.
Eventually his mother discovered how terrified he was and confronted me. We fought. I stopped using the shed.
Years later, when Grant was a teenager, I apologized.
I thought that closed it.
Apparently I had apologized for the wrong thing.
I said:
“I shouldn’t have been so strict.”
What I should have said was:
I taught you that fear is an acceptable tool when a child becomes inconvenient.
Grant looked across the kitchen at me.
“You did it to me.”
“Yes.”
“And now suddenly you’re disgusted?”
“Yes.”
He laughed bitterly.
“Convenient.”
“No.”
I forced myself not to look away.
“Late.”
That silenced him.
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Because if I expected him to own what he had done to Ava, I had to stop editing what I had done to him.
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