Danielle Ferguson's Story

Danielle Ferguson is a lonely nine-year-old little girl locked from her apartment by a man who, she thinks, is her father. She oftentimes sits in the darkened stairway listening for his footsteps and planning her escape into a darker part of the building where he can't see her when he leaves. She is afraid and makes herself as invisible as she possibly can from the man who visits her mother.

Residents see her often sitting in the darkened stairway but mostly she is ignored. She is so afraid that the bare flickering overhead light will go out leaving her completely in the dark but mostly she is afraid of him.

Danielle finally seeks refuge from an elderly neighbor who showers her with attention and love. Danielle adores the little childless black woman who loves and cares for her. Her thoughts are never far from her mother, Suzanne, or the man who fathered her, but her heart belongs to the woman who took in the abandoned child.