”“I don’t know which way you go from here,” I said. “We have two houses full of ... everything.”Sara spoke up. “Ben, I know some people ...ho liquidate estates, you know, the contents...”“I’ve heard of that.”“Well, I can get them to talk with you. Basically, you go through and set aside the stuff you want to keep, and they sell, donate, or dispose of the rest. You get part of whatever they might make on sales.”“I’ll help you go through things, Ben. I know that’s gonna be hard,” Barb said.“I can. So how does your master command you? Does he call you on the phone?”“No, Sir, he e-mails me, Sir.”By this time the boy had slouched onto the couch and put his feet up on my coffee table.“E-mails you? What a cheap cocksucker of a whole slave you are! You let some guy off in cyber-land order you around? How low is that? Boy…get these boots off!”i scrambled to my knees and started unbuckling the heavy black leather boots, trying to smell his feet without being obvious, but failing..“I saw you. There are times I can close my eyes and touch, smell, hear, and taste those other times. Memories less clear drift through my mind as nebulous and inconsequential as clouds seen from an airplane window. I think I'm looking for a beginning but I haven't found it yet. Twenty-three years ago seemed a likely point but I'm not sure. Maybe I'll just call it the beginning until something more definite comes to mind.It started snowing the day before, while we were in school. In February, the heart of. It is her hair that I recall seeing first as I peered through the rotten wood. Having made my way around the boat house, I finally saw a sliver of light amongst the undergrowth, and treading carefully I waded through the nettles to peer within. What I saw drove away any irritation caused by the stinging vegetation, for the first sight I beheld was Aunt Anna’s hair as it rose and fell. I couldn’t see the man’s face at first for a wooden pillar blocked my view and he was partly turned away from.