Dielle and I munch on saltine crackers in the dark. She curls up into my side, nustling her head into the soft of cotton, where she can be warm and protected. I hold my arm over her back protectively, sweeping my fingers along her back occasionally, stroking her, letting her know that I am here.

In the wintertime, the leaves grow frost before even the grass: it takes only a few hours into the sunset for them to turn crisp and white, thousands of pillards of ice crowning on them as they bow their heads. The grass turns still and frigid a few hours later, white snaking up its spindles and encasing its green.

Both these phenomenons have already taken place by the time Dielle closes her eyes beside me and the two of us curl together on the sofa, legs touching ever so slightly as she wraps herself into as small a shape as she can fit. At six years old, she’s not as small as she used to be, but still rather tiny.

I turn on the television, wielding heavy plastic in my right hand, pushing button after button mercilessly until the DVD screen finally appears. I press the green button play, and Dielle and I snuggle closer, the two of us alone and secure.

Mum left us alone tonight together, having gone out for dinner with a man she had met at a ‘coffeeshop’ (but Dielle and I both know that the only type of coffee she ever buys is laced with something much stronger than caffeine), and in turn leaving us with free reign of the television and a dangling ‘don’t stay up for me.’ That’s fine, we thought. We’ll stay up just because we can.

Mum didn’t lock the cabinet so we picked the only movie I had not yet memorized each line of- in fact, upon reading the back cover, I realized I had never even seen it. The red icon on the bottom labeled R told me that I should probably not be watching it at all, but Dielle’s fearless eyes reassured me that we could handle it. It was just a movie, after all.

We watch the opening credits in silence. Dielle has already begun to let her knuckles flutter, something she has a tendency to do when she is near the point of no return; sleep is on its way. I nudge her shoulder, reminding her that the movie is starting. She nudges me back and continues to let her muscles twitch as they like.

The first man to appear on the television is bathed in blackness; in fact, he is so black that the only thing clearly visible in the picture is the glinting blade he clutches as he saunters down a flight of stairs, swathed in darkness. Dielle opens her eyes to focus on the screen as the first woman is taken by his steady hand, and flinches as her scream resonates through our silent house. Dielle does not close her eyes again. I hold out a saltine to her and she takes a nibble.

The man’s name is revealed to be Hansen Lourde. I tense when he knifes a woman named Lisa, swiveling imaginary ties inside my mind to my mother, far from home, another Lisa spending a dark evening with a strange man. Dielle is more frightened when he pulls a pistol on a frivolous clucking hen; her squeal at its silence is in a way more shocking than anything either of us had yet witnessed, snapping our necks and bringing us back into the room around us, creaking and looming with unexplored crevices.

Somewhere around the fourth woman stabbed, Dielle crawls her way into my lap, scrunching her eyes and trying to nod off, but too awake to come anywhere close to succeeding. After ten minutes of pointedly looking away, she brings her nose back towards the screen, and the two of us return to our unblinking, mesmerized stares. The saltines are finished.

An hour and forty minutes pass. When Hansen creeps off into the night, unshot, undiscovered, and unseen, Dielle and I are frozen. As the credits roll, we are tense. As they finish, we begin to regain use of our limbs; I test out an arm gingerly. It moves, stiff, but soon Dielle has snuck back onto the couch beside me and I am stretching out my legs, and she hers, and we are both awake and fully ourselves once more.

I pick her up and carry her soft body to Mum’s enormous bed. Dielle and I huddle up beside each other, underneath the comforter, toes beginning to warm but ears cold in the cool nighttime air.

I flip onto my side, Dielle’s tiny frame now pressing lightly against my back. I feel her muscles tense with mine and know she is watching the shadows warp, twisting themselves into grotesque silhouettes, staggering towards us in menacing saunters. I spin onto my other side and bury my face into Dielle’s warm back.

She sits up abruptly. I watch as her eyes dart left to right, to the floor, to the window, to me. They are bright with fear and caution. I sit up too, but am flattened within seconds by the paralyzing realization that the door is swinging shut of its own accord. Dielle gradually lowers herself once more, eyes wide, body deliberately slow. I somehow rake the courage to pull the comforter and pale sheets over both of our heads and we breathe, together, warming our alcove with hot exhales.

Dielle is frightened. I am frightened. We exchange looks of pressing fear and feel the feet of hundreds of shadows crawling on top of us. She begins to squirm so I smooth her fur down with long, soft strokes until she settles. “Shh, Dielle. It will be okay.” She gives a mew of soft concern and I cannot help but agree. We are anything but okay.