"No fricking way," I said, "I'm not getting in that thing."

Thwack! Flicked right in my damn ear. Then again and again.

"You know what happens when you misbehave." Billy's Mom grabbed me by the neck, only this time I fought back. I slapped her hand away and tried to push her just like I did Carl. Unfortunately she was much bigger than I was and I didn't even move her an inch. She grabbed the lapel of my suit jacket with both hands, but I managed to slip out from it and slid between her legs. I made a bolt for the basement door. I would run away, I had to get away. Anywhere was better than here. I anxiously grabbed for the door knob, turned and pushed, but the door held fast. It was locked.

"No, no!" I cried. I didn't even have a chance to turn around, Billy's Mom was already right behind me. She grabbed me by the tie and yanked me down the stairs, choking me as she dragged me down the steps and across the basement floor.

"You ungrateful beast," Billy's Mom roared, "you go in there and you think about what you've done." She picked me up and pushed me into the safe. I tried to push past her, to claw my way out of the gun safe, but she pushed me back in even harder, slamming my head against the cold, hard safe.

"Wait! Wait!" The door to the safe swung close, surrounding me in darkness, then I heard the locking mechanism turn until it clicked. I was trapped, hardly able to breathe. There was only enough room in the safe to move my arms around. I couldn't sit or kneel, and the roof was only a couple of inches above my head. I started screaming and pounding on the safe, but it was solid steel.

I don't know how long I raged like that, but eventually I heard the lock click and turn, and the door to the safe opened. I tried to dive out of the safe, but Billy's Mom caught me with her foot and kicked me right back in, closing the door to the safe and locking it again.

"You can't come out until you've learned your lesson." She shouted as loud as she could, but I could barely hear her through the thick metal.

I fought against the dark and the steel until I was so tired I could barely stand. How many times had she opened the door only to shove me back in? I lost track. I finally leaned forward and rested my forehead on the inside of the safe and began to sob. Why was this happening to me? What did I do to deserve all this?

When my head touched the cold metal of the safe I felt something crusty, not smooth like the steel. I reached up to try and feel it, and after flaking off some of it I could smell iron. It was dried blood. I wondered if I had accidentally slammed my head into the safe in anger, but after quickly examining my forehead I didn't feel any blood or cuts. This blood was old anyway, how long had it been here to have dried like that?

Wait a second. I remember this.

In the dark of the safe I began to remember the last time I was in this safe, or should I say the last time Billy was in the safe, and that's when I realized something sinister.

Not only was I trapped inside Billy's body, but I had access to his memories as well. His whole life was open to me like the pages of a book.

The gun safe I was in belonged to Billy's Dad, and it was the only thing of his that Billy's Mom kept when he abandoned their family. As I tried to recall Billy's memories I realized that Billy didn't know exactly what happened to his father, only that one day when he was six his mother sat him down in his bedroom and told him that his father wasn't going to be around anymore."

That was all Billy knew about his Dad. Billy had always been a bit of a prick at middle school, but I never realized how cruel his life had been at home. When my Dad passed away, my Mom was devastated at first, but she also became stronger and more loving because of it. When Billy's Dad went away, his Mom went crazy and she took out all her anger on her son.

The door to the safe swung open once more, only this time I didn't try to escape.

"I can do this all night if I have to," Billy's Mom said.

"I'm ready to come out now," I said, quietly.

"You seem to have calmed down. A little longer and you'll have learned your lesson." She shut the safe again, and I didn't fight back. I embraced the darkness and tried to breathe slowly. Billy's memories were wretched, but I tried to let them flow into me so I could understand exactly who I was dealing with. I learned a lot about Billy and his Mom, their miserable relationship, and why Billy acted the way he did at school. Billy was a bully because his life was shit. In a messed-up way it was a cry for help.

The worst part was that Billy didn't do anything to deserve to get treated this way. His Mom did it all because of his Dad. Come to think of it, I just realized why she punishes Billy with this gun. It's the only thing left of his Dad, and by forcing him in here his Mom was trying to get Billy to hate his Dad as much as she did.

The lock to the safe swung open, and Billy's Mom stood there staring in anticipation.

"I'll behave now, Mom," I said, wiping the tears from my cheeks.

She seemed satisfied with that answer, and stepped out of the way of the safe.

"Go and wash up, dinner will be soon."

"Why don't I make it," I said, the words came out of my mouth before I could stop them.

Billy's Mom raised her eyebrows in shock, but only for a split second, and then she nodded. Now that I could see Billy's memories I saw a different side to his Mom, I knew how to push her buttons. Yeah, she hated her husband for abandoning them, but what she really hated was that she still loved him despite everything.

I went upstairs to Billy's room to get changed out of my suit and into gym shorts and a t-shirt. I washed my hands in the bathroom and went downstairs to the kitchen. Billy's Mom was already sitting at the table with a glass of white wine and the bottle opened sitting next to her. She swirled the glass gently each time she decided to take a sip.

I looked through the fridge and freezer, and examined what we had in the pantries. I had never cooked a meal in my life, but Billy had done it a hundred times. Whenever his Mom had one to many glasses of wine it was up to him to be the man of the house and cook dinner for both of them. I was going to have to rely on pure instincts to get this dinner made properly.

Out of the corner of my eye I spied a small wooden box next to the fridge, and when I opened it I saw a small collection of note cards with recipes written on them.

Bingo! I thought, and started flicking through the recipes until I found the one that I knew would put Billy's Mom in a good mood. Shrimp Scampi, the last happy meal all three of them had eaten as a family. There was a bag of shrimp in the freezer, jarred garlic and bottled lemon juice in the fridge, and an onion and box of angel hair pasta in the cupboard. Plus, Billy's Mom had already opened the final ingredient, a bottle of cheap white wine.

I put a pan on the stove, and filled a pot with hot water and did the same. I turned on the burners so the water would start boiling, and put the shrimp in the pan frozen. They would take a little longer to cook from frozen, but that just gave me time to chop up the onion. I regretted not paying more attention in Home Economics. Billy's Mom was watching me closely, so I started a conversation with her to alleviate the awkwardness and maybe distract her in case I messed up dinner.

"Mom, how come you never talk about Dad?"

"What's there to talk about?" She said, downing the last of her wine and pouring herself another glass.

"I'm gonna be thirteen soon, don't you think you can tell me what happened?" I looked down at the onion I was cutting and it looked atrocious. I just started going back and forth with the knife until the large chunks were small enough to cook.

"He left us, Billy, that's what happened." I could tell she was getting a little mad, but I felt like this was important. I didn't know how long I was going to be trapped in Billy's body, and this seemed like a good first step to get his Mom to stop flicking me in the ear. After acquiring Billy's memories I felt a lot older, like I had lived to be twelve twice.

I took the shrimp out of the pan so they wouldn't overcook, then poured in some olive oil and the onions with a pinch of salt.

"When I'm at school, sometimes the other kids will ask me where my Dad is, and I don't really have a good answer. I used to tell them that he was away working at a science station in the arctic, but kids are nosey. They wanted to know why he didn't come home for the holidays. So for a long time whenever anybody asked I just told them he was dead, but then people would ask how he died and I didn't know how to answer that either. The truth is, I have no idea what happened to him."

The onions had softened now, and I stirred in a spoonful of garlic. Then I put the angel hair pasta in the boiling water. I was amazed that I had managed to get this far without messing anything up. Billy's Mom took a big swig, hunched over, and rested her elbows on the kitchen table.

"Your father was handsome and kind and loving, right up until the moment he wasn't. It was like he was wearing a mask and one day he decided to rip it off. He came to me, out of the blue, and said 'he didn't want to do this anymore.' He needed something new. I thought if I gave him some space, he would realize he was wrong and come back to us. I waited, but he never even called. I waited until the day I saw him at the mall with his new family, a younger woman and an infant girl, and I realized that he wasn't talking about being a husband or a father. I realized that he was talking about us. He didn't want to be with us anymore." Billy's Mom reached for the bottle of wine, but I grabbed onto the neck of the bottle before she could take it.

"For the scampi," I said, and slowly pulled it from her grasp. I splashed the onions and garlic to deglaze the pan, and walked back over and filled up her glass.

"You talked about not knowing what to tell your friends, Billy. The truth is, I don't know what happened myself. I've never known how to tell you." She took another big swig, and I tried to finish dinner as quickly as I could to stop her from getting too tipsy.

I added lemon juice, a dash of parsley and red pepper flakes, the cooked shrimp, then I drained the pasta and put it in the pan with the rest of the ingredients. A couple of stirs with a wooden spoon and it was ready. I grabbed two plates and scooped us up a serving.

I sat down with Billy's Mom and watched as she took a first bite.

"How is it?" I asked.

"Good," she said.

I took a bite and it was not good, but it was edible. I quickly scarfed down a few bites. That's when I noticed Billy's Mom had a tear in her eye, but she quickly brought a napkin to her eye before it could fall. Maybe it was the wine, or maybe it was the meal I made for her, but she seemed like a completely different person than she was an hour ago. Billy's Mom was just as much a bully as he was, but maybe that was because she had lived an even sadder life than Billy.

"Can I be excused, Mom," I asked, "it's been a long day."

Billy's Mom nodded, and I put my dishes in the sink and went to Billy's room. After shutting the door behind me, I started crying again. Before today I couldn't remember the last time I cried. It had to have been years, probably when my Dad passed away. I went over to Billy's bed and dived in, burying my head into his pillow to absorb my tears.

None of this was fair, I couldn't help but sob. All I wanted was to go home to my Mom and give her a big hug. I wanted to tell her how much I loved her and how kind she was and how grateful I should have been. I never thanked her once for being so great to me, and I realized that now.

Who knows how long I just laid there crying, but after some good sobs, I took a deep breath, and felt a cold breeze. I rolled over in bed, and a hand shot forward and grabbed my mouth.

"If you scream, I'll kill you."

It was Carl, and he had a knife pointed at my throat.