Her mother brought Kristi inside and put Kristi in her room. Kristi saw the fear on her mother’s face. Kristi had never seen her father so mad before. Her mother put her in the closet hoping that Kristi’s father would not find her and hurt her.
She stood shivering against the wall in the unlit closet of her bedroom. She could hear her own breathing which had almost returned to its natural rhythm, and she could hear her mother and father shouting at each other.
“Did you have to do that?” Kristi’s mother shouted trying to be heard over her husband.
“Do what? Damn it. I bet she still has it. She probably went in there, took it out and hid it somewhere,” the father said using all his lung power to force the words out. He could knock a person to the ground with his words.
Kristi stood in the closet fighting the tears that were running down her face. She whispered, “I hate him.”
“Don’t you ever do that again! You scared the hell out of her.”
“I’ll do what ever I damn well please. This is my house! You better stay the hell out of my way.”
Kristi heard her dad stomp down the hall in his heavy boots, slamming the door as he left. She could her mother’s footsteps coming down the narrow hall by the bathroom to the bedroom. Her mother came in and found her in the closet.
“Kristi, are you okay?”
“Yes, mom.”
“You can go to bed now. Daddy won’t be back for a while.”
“Okay.”
“Don’t worry. I won’t let him hurt you again.”

“Kristi, it’s time for supper,” her mother yelled from the kitchen.
“Coming, mom.”
After she finished her supper, She got the cups and coffee pot she used that afternoon from the kitchen where they had been drying. Kristi went into the playroom and turned on the lights in the adjoining rooms. She took the dishes back to the playhouse and stacked them carefully under the sink. She sat down at the table, picked up her little piano from the floor and began playing. She played with one finger “Mary Had a Little Lamb” and “Hot Cross Buns.” Those were the only songs she knew how to play. She was interrupted by her father yelling.
“Where’s my damn flashlight?” he yelled at Kristi’s mother.
“I don’t know. Probably wherever you left it,” she replied sarcastically.
“I left it on my work table. I need it to look through the barrel of one of my guns,” he said loudly.
“Ask Kristi. Maybe she knows were it is.”
“Yeah. She probably has it. She always uses it and never returns it,” her father said knowing that he was right.
“Kristi, get in here!” her father yelled, loudly so it could be heard throughout the house.
Kristi shuddered. She didn’t say anything for a few seconds. She had heard that tone in her father’s voice before, and she hesitated before going into the living room. “Coming!” she yelled back as she ran out of the playroom down the hallway into the living room.
She walked quickly out of the playroom down the hallway into the dining room where her mother and father were standing.
“Have you seen your father’s flashlight?” her mother asked softly.
“No.”
“Did you use one today?”
“Yes . . . but I put it back,” she answered, her voice starting to quake.
“I just bet you did. You probably have it in that stupid playhouse of yours,” her father injected.
“No. I put it back,” she said beginning to cry.
“I know you have it. You’re a liar. I’m going to look for myself,” her father said.
Kristi’s mother just stood there looking weakly at her daughter knowing what her husband might do if he found it.
Her father went down the hallway into the playroom searching for the flashlight. Kristi and her mother followed him. He was certain he would find it. The longer he searched, the angrier he got until he was raging.
“Damn it! Kristi, where in the hell did you put my flashlight?” he screamed. His face turned redder every second, and his eyes turned gray and cloudy.
“I told you I don’t have it,” Kristi said from a corner of the room. Now the tears were streaming down her face.
“I’m going to go through everything in this room until I find it,” he announced.
He took the cardboard playhouse and lifted it up from the floor, threw it down and kicked it out the playroom down the hallway until he was at the back door. He opened the door and threw the playhouse outside over the wooden landing. The playhouse landed near the swing set. Then he went back into the room and emptied the boxes of toys and kicked the empty boxes and toys down the hallway and out the door. Some went down the open wooden stairs, while others fell 50 feet to the ground.
“Where in the hell is it? Where did you hide it?” he said to Kristi when he walked into the playroom again.
He continued to go through every box and threw everything down the stairs. He still hadn’t found the flashlight, and he was getting angrier.
She stood in the corner shaking. She was speechless. She knew he wouldn’t find it, but couldn’t tell him that she didn’t have his flashlight.
He grabbed Susie, the doll, and threw her on the floor and shoved her down the hallway and out the door with his foot. Next, he took the refrigerator and emptied it searching for his flashlight. He took the refrigerator and hurled it over the landing, and it fell to the ground. Next he took the sink and stove and emptied them and kicked them down the hallway scratching the paint on the walls until they were outside where they crashed on top of the toys already below. The wooden table and chairs were pushed down the hallway and down the stairs.
All her toys, the dishes, the kitchen set and table and chairs were outside. Even her toy piano lay on top of the rubble. Kristi stood on the landing with tears rolling down her face. Her playhouse was wrecked. The metal kitchen set was bent and could no longer be used. The metal had split in some places leaving sharp edges. The little piano laid at the bottom of the stairs on top of everything. The legs were broken and some of the keys were missing. Her dishes were scattered everywhere. Some were broken. The table had survived its fall, but the chairs had broken dowels. The paint was chipped on the table and chairs. The doll was muddy and her dress that was once Kristi’s dress was ripped. The containers of Play-Doh had popped open and the dough was beginning to dry. But the flashlight was not found.

…to be continued