Summary

“Armadillo Man” is told in the present tense by a third-person limited narrator in 2013, focalized through a young teenager named Sofia. The story opens by Sofia standing naked in front of her window, writing the alphabet with her butt so that the Armadillo Man, who lives next door, can see. Sofia claims she knows he is watching, even though he never appears to be looking at her. As the story progresses, it becomes clear that Sofia is hired to help the Armadillo Man around the house, for the Armadillo Man, although only middle-aged, walks with a cane and cannot take care of himself.

Sofia reports her nightmares, in which “she sees fingers growing out of the floor [of a church]” and “the air… smells like rotten eggs” (200). Sofia wakes up and goes to keep the Armadillo Man company, remembering that...