The cabin had become a cathedral of ruin.

Sunlight never fully penetrated the pine-choked windows anymore; the glass was smeared with handprints, streaks of drying piss, smears of cum that caught the weak rays and turned them obscene. The iron bed sagged in the center from constant use. The floorboards were permanently darkened in irregular patches—golden halos where bladders had emptied in ecstasy or punishment. The air was thick, almost chewable: musk, ammonia, semen, sweat, the faint copper of old blood that never quite washed out of memory.