Hourglass

"Charlie," " what do you want to do now, Charlie? Would you like to hear another bedtime story,? his mother used to say. An answer was always easy, because he was always excited to say yes. The truth was, he could never get enough of her sitting in the chair at the end of his bed and her reading to him every night. While her choices of literature were at times probably not appropriate, and far beyond his young age, her soft words ended up taking him to places that as a child he could only dream about. Together they had shared many great adventures.

. Oddly enough though, they had carried on this practice well into his teenage years. For him, it was the best part of his childhood. So much in fact, that it had become an obsession. It was both wanted and expected. It was their "thing".

. Little did he know that years later, those private moments in time would come back to haunt him. The stories his mother had shared were each carefully chosen and deliberate. Each one would leave such a lasting impression on him that over time, he discovered that they had all been part of one giant manipulation. His mother had used them to mold his thoughts, feelings, and behavior and turned him into exactly what she wanted. Now, for Charlie the only question was why?