If you were to ask someone from Eugene or Portland, they’d tell you that Junction City was a “quaint little town”. Time seemed to amble along at a slower pace. Sleepy, whatever that means. Either that, or they’d yawn and say, “Never heard of it.”

Once a rancher, overseeing the execution of vast herds of beef cattle, Stephen had abruptly retreated from the world, seeking solace in the confines of his garage. Day after day, he would sit there, a solitary figure, his gaze fixed on the bustling high school across the street. Many speculated about the reasons behind his sudden withdrawal, but few dared to approach the enigmatic old man.

As the lunch bell rang each afternoon, Stephen would take his position in the garage, surrounded by posters of nude women, younger than his grandchildren, a weathered tool bench his constant companion. With a pair of binoculars in hand, he would meticulously observe the teenage girls as they went about their daily lives. From the cheerleaders’ spirited routines to the shy glances of the bookworms, every detail seemed to captivate him.

Some dismissed Stephen Stinson as a harmless voyeur, but others saw something deeper in his eyes. A longing. “Perhaps he’s reliving his own youth through them, or maybe he is simply seeking a connection to the world he had left behind,” they would say. “He’s the perfect example of good things happening to bad people,” others would attest. Whatever his reasons, Stephen’s lone vigil had become an integral part of the town’s folklore.

As the years passed, Stephen’s presence in the garage became as familiar as the changing seasons. The girls at the high school would often catch a glimpse of the old man and whisper among themselves, a mix of curiosity, fear, and pity in their eyes. Some felt a tinge of sadness for the cloistered figure, while others found his behavior unsettling. Their unease only increased when he took to cruising the neighborhood in the afternoon, his car creeping past playgrounds and parks as he leered out the window.

Years ago, decades, Stephen and his wife, Eileen had two teenaged children of their own. Their daughter, Mary, had disappeared one summer while on a family hiking trip. Some posited he missed his teenage daughter and that was the cause of his lengthy stares.

Stephen had always been a bit of a loner, haunted by the demons of his past, his eyes dimmed by the shadows that clung to him like a second skin. He lived a reclusive life, shunning the company of others and finding solace only in the company of his own twisted thoughts.

One day, a young girl named Lily decided to confront Stephen. With a mixture of trepidation and compassion, she approached the garage and cautiously introduced herself. To her surprise, Stephen responded with a gentle smile and invited her to sit with him.

Stephen struck up a conversation with Lily, sharing tales of his own youth and offering what he perceived, in his all-encompassing, self-important manner, as words of wisdom. Lily found comfort in Stephen’s stories and soon, they formed an unlikely friendship. She would visit him often, seeking solace in his company.

Captivated by her presence, Stephen’s obsession grew with each passing day until it consumed him entirely. Consumed by a madness he could no longer control, he made a decision that would alter both their lives forever.

His loneliness twisted into obsession and one fateful evening he took matters into his own hands. With careful planning, he lured Lily into his home under the guise of sharing a meal.

Once inside, Stephen revealed his true intentions, locking the doors and windows, trapping Lily within his grasp, descending on her like a predator stalking its prey. At first, Lily couldn’t comprehend what was happening, feeling a mix of fear and betrayal. She pleaded with Stephen to let her go, but as his grip around her throat tightened, his grip on reality slipped away.

Years ago, in the featureless suburban neighborhood, nestled behind a facade of picket fences and blooming gardens, lived Stephen and Eileen. To the outside world, they seemed like the perfect couple, but behind closed doors, their home was shrouded in darkness.

At first, the abuse was subtle, hidden beneath layers of manipulation and deceit. Stephen would belittle Eileen with cutting remarks, chipping away at her self-esteem until she felt like nothing more than a shadow of her former self.

But as time passed, Stephen’s cruelty knew no bounds. He would fly into fits of rage over the smallest of slights, his fists raining down upon Eileen with a brutality that left her bruised and broken.

You see, Junction City started out as a company town. The mid-century settlers all worked for the local industry. As a long-time local and landowner, Stephen had a certain amount of sway with the management. Just enough pull to hold the employment of Eileen’s family over her head.

Physically and emotionally battered, Eileen felt trapped in her own home, her spirit crushed under the weight of Stephen’s oppression. She longed for escape, but fear held her prisoner, the thought of what Stephen might do if she dared leave paralyzing her with terror.

Deep within Eileen’s shattered heart, a spark of defiance flickered to life. She refused to be a victim any longer, determined to break free from Stephen’s iron grip.

Over the years, and especially into his retirement, Stephen had a fondness for cheap, mass-produced lager. It started when he was found to be at the center of a voter-fraud scheme through his church. Although it led to more-frequent, more-brutal beatings, Eileen encouraged his drinking habit like a Pavlovian trainer. Each time she’d bring Stephen a beer, she would add a drop of tetrahydrozoline. It was something she’d heard about the rebels doing many years ago, when they were trying to salvage their version of democracy.

As the months – and assaults – dragged on, any time Stephen would comment on his can-o’-lite tasting ‘off’, she’d offer to get him a fresh one. He’d, of course, decline and accept, not wanting the first to go to waste, but eager for more. Once he stopped making comments about stale beer, Eileen stopped adding the drops, in case he’d built up a tolerance.

One moonless night, as Stephen crashed around the house in a drunken stupor, Eileen seized her chance. She added an entire bottle of tetra to a silver can and presented it to her husband. He swiped it away and chugged it down, belching and collapsing on the couch.

With trembling hands, she packed a bag with the few belongings she could carry and slipped out into the darkness, leaving behind the prison of her marriage.

Alone and afraid, Eileen found refuge in the warm embrace of a women’s shelter, where kind souls helped her heal the wounds of both body and soul. With their support, she began to rebuild her life, reclaiming the strength and independence that Stephen had tried so desperately to crush.

Meanwhile, Stephen’s world crumbled around him as the consequences of his actions finally caught up with him.

But for Eileen, the darkness had lifted, replaced by a newfound sense of freedom and empowerment. Though scarred by her ordeal, she emerged from the shadows stronger than ever before, a survivor in every sense of the word.

That is, until Stephen found her….

As Lily collapsed on the tattered kitchen rug, Stephen was reminded of his late wife. Left alone in his empty house, he was forced to confront the emptiness of his own soul, the echoes of his abuse calling out to him like ghosts from the past. He saw in Lily a chance to fill the void that had consumed him for so long, a chance to make her his own.

Killing animals didn’t do it for him anymore. After his wife’s oxygen tank ‘mysteriously’ gave out, the first thing he did – before calling 911, even – was put her cat in a plastic bag and throw it in the canal by his house. Fortunately, a man walking his dog late that night heard the cries of the poor creature and released her from her watery tomb. He took her home to live out the rest of her eight lives in peace and comfort.

The man walking his dog was more traumatized than the cat, probably. While he did everything to help Snowball III recover from her ordeal, he never recovered himself. The burning rage transformed him from a calm, compassionate individual to a murderous misanthrope. In his eyes, nobody who would do something like that to an animal deserved to live. Though, death was too kind for those scumbags. He had to figure out a way to really make them pay for their sins.

“Ducky, you gotta get over here. I need a little help.”

“What is it now, another complaint about the destitute woman living in the trailer down the block? Someone walked on your lawn again?” The police chief sighed into the phone. “And stop calling me that, you geezerly fuck.”

“No, I finally caught one.”

Mark flipped the switch for the lights and sirens in his cruiser and sped through downtown, blowing through stop signs and nearly taking out a couple of pedestrians on his way down Sixth Street.

At Stephen’s house, Mark cut the ropes from Lily’s unconscious body and replaced them with handcuffs and shackles. Together, he and Stephen rolled her in an old tarp from the garage and loaded her into the back seat of his police car without regard to the prying eyes of neighbors. He was the chief of police, after all, what were they going to do about it? They snatched her from the world she knew and spirited her away to the depths of a ranch where no one would ever find them.

A few miles south, the sun kissed the earth in hues of orange and gold, illuminating the Sunset Ranch. One of thousands with the same generic name. It was partly due to lack of originality and partly for the anonymity. It could have been Bar-AE or Hidden Valley or Circle-J. Whatever the name, it was a serene oasis of rugged beauty. A place where the whisper of the wind danced through the tall grasses and the warmth of the sun kissed the earth. But behind its picturesque facade lurked a darkness that tainted its tranquility.

Lily woke up, dazed and groggy, to piles of alfalfa hay and oat grain. Looking around, it was clear her prison was an old, weather-beaten barn. Its wooden walls bore the scars of time, and its roof sagged under the weight of years gone by. Within its dimly lit interior, still confused, but with focused purpose, Lily ran to the doors, only to find them locked and barricaded from the outside.

Her screams and pounding at the door were met in short order by a high-pressure blast from a water cannon that was mounted to the ceiling of the barn. The kind of water cannon you’d find attached to a turret atop a tank that was purchased with taxpayer money to feed an already overinflated law-enforcement budget.

Lily cowered in the corner, behind the stacked bales of hay, hoping for protection from the next icy blast. Not knowing where she was or how she got there, Lily began to sob.

In short order, her cries were interrupted by a rattling above her head. Footsteps in the loft and the sound of a familiar voice answered, at least, the ‘who’ and ‘why’ questions she had about her imprisonment.

“So it’s five-hundred for the hour, do whatever you want, so long as you don’t put her out of commission.” The gravelly voice of the old man carried itself down the stairs from the loft.

Behind Stephen, a balding, obese man in a cheap suit reached into the pocket of his cheap suit jacket. Lily recognized him from somewhere but couldn’t place it. Maybe at her track meets or tennis matches.

Collecting the money from the fat man, Stephen turned and ascended the stairs. The door slammed shut, sealing her fate within the suffocating confines of the barn. Panic surged through her veins as she pounded on the walls, calling out for help, but her cries echoed unanswered in the empty expanse. The rattle of chains and padlocks told Lily that escape would be impossible.

The fat man removed his glasses, licking his chops as he stared at Lily. She froze, unable to run or fight or even cry, as the man crushed her under his tremendous weight. He pressed her face into the fecal-marred floor, ripping her tennis shorts off and forcing himself into her unlubricated anus.

Lily closed her eyes and counted her breaths until it was over. Six-hundred-thirty-eight. Withdrawing and fastening his belt, her rapist wiped the sweat from his face, retrieved his glasses, and spit on Lily, before making his way upstairs and banging on the door.

Lily closed her eyes and entered a dreamless sleep. As she nodded off, she prayed to never wake up.

Days turned into weeks, and Lily’s hope began to wane as she languished in captivity. The only company she had were the shadows that danced across the walls, mocking her with their silent taunts. With each passing day, she searched for any means of escape, meticulously scouring every inch of the locked room in the barn for a way out.

Stephen’s once-kind demeanor morphed into something sinister as he spiraled further into madness. Between the parade of various police officers and city officials who arrived in succession to have their way with her, Stephen would stand in the loft, throwing things at her, urinating on her, and verbally abusing her with humiliating and degrading comments.

As if possessed, or in another cruel, calculated attempt to destroy her psyche, he tempered his abuse by showering her with gifts and empty promises. Once, he brought her a puppy to keep her company, only to return two days later to kill the innocent pup. Gifts of chocolate and cheeseburgers were followed by days of starvation or rotting, maggot-infested fruit.

Meanwhile, the town buzzed with concern over Lily’s disappearance. Flyers were plastered on every street corner and search parties scoured the area, desperate to find any trace of the missing girl. The chief of police issued an Amber Alert and led the rescue efforts, directing the searchers to investigate the Willamette River and Fern Ridge Lake, but deliberately avoiding the wide-open plains of ranch land between those two locations.

Through the long, lonely nights and the endless days of captivity, Lily refused to surrender to despair. With a strength born of resilience and a spirit that refused to be broken, she clung to the hope of escape, biding her time until the moment was right. Beneath the weight of Stephen’s oppression, a fire began to burn within Lily’s heart. Perhaps led by the spirit of Eileen, she refused to be a victim, determined to reclaim her freedom at any cost.