You want to act you are so much better than me, don’t you? I want to hear you say it. Say it!”

She paced across the room again. She’d start in the middle, directly out from in front of her prisoner. She’d go to the window on the left side of the room, then going to the right side. It was a repeating process, when she stopped it would be back in the middle as she continued to yell at him.

He tried moving, but the chains that kept his hands pinned to the floor restricted how much he could move.

“Maybe it’s time to calm down, Alyssa. You need to let me out so we can talk.”

She stopped in the middle of the room, getting closer to his face to scream some more. “Shut up! Shut up! Shut up! You are not the one in control anymore! You have to listen to me!” And like that she was pacing again.

He looked down at his feet, were that stupid note laid. It was addressed to him, obviously in his handwriting. He hadn’t remembered writing it, but he agreed with the contents. Get out immediately.

He stared at her as she did her pacing. It was wild to him that just a couple of months ago, that was the girl that he was going to marry. Now he laid on her basement floor, a prisoner to her, waiting for her next move.

She wasn’t always crazy, she never was crazy, actually. They had a normal relationship. They were high school sweethearts, getting engaged shortly after graduating highschool. He came home one day, her nowhere to be found. It was odd, she was always home when he arrived. After days of waiting, she finally made it back. She was changed, their relationship ended a week later. He never learned of what happened in those few days while she was gone, but something had messed her up.

They went months without speaking. Then yesterday, she appeared at his front door. She seemed like her old self briefly. His last memory in his apartment, was her standing over him, his eyes getting really heavy.

“Alyssa, don’t yell. I know you don’t like to yell. We can talk about this, sweetie. Whatever is wrong. Would you just sit down? For a minute?”

She backed away from him, shaking her head. He could tell she had tears running down her face, she just crouched into her own ball, he could hear her cries.

Alyssa, please. I still love you, we just need to work this out, baby.”

She looked up at him, smiling. She slowly crawled over to him, hugging up against him. In her pocket, he saw his only escape. The key. And all he had to do was reach...