The school called.
“Your daughter hasn’t been picked up. It’s been three hours.”
My name is Lena Hail. I’m twenty-eight.
I’m an architect in Portland. I thought I was ordinary, and then one phone call rewrote my entire life.
The call came on a Tuesday at 6:42 p.m. I was at my desk, fingers black with charcoal from a sketch, designing a library—a quiet, safe building.
My phone buzzed with an unknown number.
“This is Lena Hail.”
A woman’s voice was tight with frustration.
“Miss Hail, this is Crestview Elementary. Your daughter hasn’t been picked up. It’s been three hours.”
I stopped breathing.
The charcoal pencil rolled off my desk and snapped on the floor.
“You have the wrong number,” I said.
“I don’t have a daughter.”
Silence. Then the woman sighed, a sound so tired it hurt.
“Is this Lena Hail? 4500 Westland Drive?”
“Yes, but—”
“Then she’s your daughter.
She’s right here. She’s the last one, Ms. Hail.
We’ve been calling for hours.”
My first thought was a prank. My second was, why did she sound so sure?
“I’m telling you, I don’t have a child,” I said again, my voice shaking.
“She’s asking for you by name.”
I hung up. I stared at the wall, heart hammering.
I didn’t have a daughter. I knew my own life, and yet I grabbed my keys anyway. I don’t know why.
I just—I had to see. I had to see the face of the lie.
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The drive to the school was only fifteen minutes. It felt like an hour. My knuckles went white on the steering wheel, rain heavy on the windshield, the wipers making a terrible screaming sound.
Screech.
Thump. Screech. Thump.
“This is a mistake,” I kept saying.
A stupid clerical error. Someone with the same name. It happens.
But the woman’s voice kept replaying in my head.
She’s asking for you by name.
How could a child I’d never met ask for me?
Maybe it was a trap, a scam—someone trying to lure me to a dark school.
But that made no sense. This was an elementary school, not a dark alley.
I pulled into the parking lot. It was empty except for one red sedan near the entrance.
The building was dark, just like the woman said. Only one light was on—the main office.
I sat in my car for a full minute, heart high in my throat, skin cold. Go in.
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