"You just don't understand me, Dad!" Maggie shouted from the top of the stairs.
"And you don't understand that I'm trying to protect you, Maggie!" her father, Mike, shouted after her.
Arguments like that had become more and more common between the father and daughter in the years since Mike's wife and Maggie's mother, Scarlett, passed away, with Mike having to become a single father rather quickly, and raising a teenage girl wasn't easy *with* his wife, so it was nigh-impossible without her. And even after she'd turned eighteen and started attending a nearby college, the two still got into verbal sparring matches nearly every single night. The current fight was over whether or not Maggie could attend a frat party that upcoming weekend.
"But I'm eighteen! I'm an adult and I can make my own choices!"
"You may be an adult, but you still live under my roof and I know what frat guys are like and I don't want you anywhere near them! You see what goes on at these parties on the news!"
"I hate you!" Maggie shouted as she rushed to the stairs.
Following the fight, Mike had grumbled for a bit before cracking open a beer and sitting down in his recliner in front of the TV, where, unknown to him, Maggie was laying in bed, her eyes red from crying, and they both independently had the same thought.
"I just wish that she knew what it's like to be me!"
"I just wish that he knew what it's like to be me!"
At that moment, the lights in the house flickered, but neither party thought much of it, and they both later fell asleep exactly where they were. During the night, Mike's dreams were preoccupied with his fears of what might happen to Maggie at the frat party while Maggie's dreams were preoccupied with her father being lame and ruining her life.
In the morning, Mike's slumber was disturbed by a scream coming from upstairs. Inherently he knew it belonged to Maggie, even if, despite his sleep-addled state, he was subconsciously aware that the scream sounded like it came from a man and not a young woman. Mike rushed upstairs, not realizing that his pajama bottoms had slipped off during the night, leaving him running upstairs in just a t-shirt and boxers. He considered knocking on the door, but in his panicked state, Mike just quickly threw open the door to Maggie's room and found...
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