“Stay,” I say. My voice doesn’t sound like mine. It sounds like the one I used in fire drills with first-graders.
The calm one. The one that made shaking little hands let go of cubbies and follow the line. “In the closet?” Jake whispers.
“For one minute,” I say. “Then we’re going to do a drill, okay? Like school.
A quiet, sneaky drill.”
Lily gives a wet little hiccup. “We don’t have a teacher here.”
“You do now,” I say. “It’s me.”
The text—DO NOT CALL POLICE—glows on my screen.
No name. Just a number. I take a breath, hold it, let it out slow.
“Tell me where the closet is,” I say. “In Mommy’s room,” Jake says. “The one with the mirror doors.”
“Okay.
Is there anything in there? Clothes, boxes?”
“Shoes,” Lily whispers. “And a laundry basket.”
“Good,” I say.
“I want you to do three things for me, very quietly. Ready?”
“Ready,” Jake says. “First,” I say, “sit on the floor and pull some clothes over your legs.
Like a blanket. Second, put the phone on silent. No sounds at all.
Third, keep me on the call, but don’t talk unless I ask a question. Do you understand?”
“Yes,” they whisper together. On their end, I hear a rustle, the soft scrape of a hanger bumping a wall.
A muffled thump from farther away—that deep, heavy sound again. A man’s footsteps, heavier than Mark’s, heavier than Sarah’s. Too familiar in a way I’ve tried not to name for months.
I hit the home button with my thumb, keep the call open, and tap my own contacts with the other hand. There’s only one person I know who picks up emergency calls faster than a dispatcher: Denise, former teacher, now 911 operator, the woman who used to share stale staff-room donuts and stories about her shift. The DO NOT CALL POLICE text flashes again in my mind.
It doesn’t matter. You told me to stay away, I think, looking at the bruise in the microwave door. But they didn’t.
I put the phone on speaker, cover it with my palm, and hit Denise’s name. She answers on the second ring. “Elena?
I’m at work, can I—”
“Denise,” I cut in softly. “I have two grandkids in a house with an unknown man. Their mother may be unconscious.
I received a text telling me not to call the police. I’m calling anyway.”
Her voice changes. Tightens.
The story doesn’t end here — it continues on the next page.
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