Chapter 3 - Sunday Was Too LateThe emergency room smelled like antiseptic, coffee, and fear.
I had been in hospitals before. At my age, everyone has. I had sat beside Carol while machines breathed numbers into the dark. I had watched doctors use gentle words when there were no gentle facts left. I had learned that hospital clocks moved differently from regular clocks. One minute could stretch into an hour if someone you loved was behind a curtain.
Lily and Mason disappeared into separate rooms.
I stood in the hallway with my hands empty.
That was when I realized I was still wearing my house slippers.
One was dark blue. The other was Carol’s old gray one, because I had grabbed whatever my feet found in the bedroom. For some reason, that nearly undid me.
A nurse touched my elbow.
“Mr. Whitaker?”
“Yes.”
“I need some information. Allergies, medications, medical history.”
“I know some,” I said. “Not enough.”
“Do you have the parents’ numbers?”
“Yes.”
I called Brian first.
Straight to voicemail.
His recorded voice filled my ear.
Hey, this is Brian. Leave a message.
I almost laughed.
Leave a message.
What kind of message was there for this?
Your children are in the hospital.
Your daughter was drugged.
Your son was locked in a closet.
Your father is trying very hard not to hate you before he knows everything.
I hung up without speaking.
Then I called Marissa.
It rang once.
Twice.
Then someone rejected the call.
The screen went dark in my hand.
The nurse saw my face.
“No answer?”
“No.”
“We’ll keep trying.”
A doctor came out twenty minutes later. Dr. Patel. Small woman, steady voice, tired eyes.
“Mr. Whitaker?”
I stood too quickly. The wall tilted.
“They’re alive,” she said before anything else.
I closed my eyes.
“They’re both alive.”
A sound came out of me. Not a word. Not a sob. Something older than both.
Dr. Patel gave me one second, then continued.
“Lily has a high fever and signs of dehydration. We’re also concerned about sedation. We’re running toxicology, but from what you described and what we’re seeing, she was given medication inappropriate for her age and condition.”
“Inappropriate,” I repeated.
The word was too clean.
“Yes,” she said softly. “Mason is dehydrated, exhausted, and showing acute stress response. He has abrasions on his hands. No major fractures that we can see, but we’ll monitor him.”
“How long was he in that closet?”
Her eyes tightened.
“We don’t know yet.”
“I want to see them.”
“You can see Lily first. She’s asking for you.”
The room was dim when I entered.
Lily looked smaller in the hospital bed than she had on my living room couch, where she used to build forts out of afghans and declare herself queen of the remote control. An IV line ran into her arm. A cooling blanket lay across her. Her cheeks were still flushed, but her eyes opened when she heard me.
“Grandpa?”
I sat beside her and took the hand without the IV.
“I’m here.”
“Mason?”
“He’s here too. Doctors are taking care of him.”
She blinked slowly. “Mom said Sunday.”
“What about Sunday?”
“She said we only had to be good until Sunday.”
A cold line moved down my back.
“What did being good mean, sweetheart?”
Her mouth tightened.
I recognized that look. Children wear it when they are trying to decide whether truth is more dangerous than silence.
“Lily,” I said, “you are not in trouble.”
“Mom said if I told, they’d say I was confused.”
“You’re not confused.”
“She said the medicine makes stories.”
I leaned closer.
“What stories?”
Her eyes filled.
“That Mason was in the closet.”
I kept my face still with effort.
“And was he?”
She nodded.
“Why?”
“Because he spilled the water.”
I thought of the crushed bottle at Mason’s knee.
“What water?”
“The one for me. He said I shouldn’t drink more. He said I was too hot and sleepy. Mom got mad.”
“Was your dad there?”
A tear slid into Lily’s hair.
“Daddy cried.”
That answer was worse than yes.
“Where did he cry?”
“In the kitchen.”
“What did he say?”
She stared at the ceiling.
“He said, ‘This has gone too far.’”
My throat closed.
“And then?”
“Mom said, ‘You signed it too.’”
The room hummed around us.
Machines.
Fluorescent lights.
My own blood.
“What did he sign, Lily?”
“I don’t know.”
Her eyelids lowered.
“She said if Grandpa came, tell him not to open the closet.”
“Why?”
“Because Mason would say things.”
“What things?”
Lily’s hand tightened around mine.
“The room under the stairs.”
I looked toward the door.
“What room under the stairs?”
Her lips barely moved.
“The one where Mommy keeps the papers.”
Then her eyes closed.
A nurse stepped in and checked the monitor.
“She needs rest.”
I rose slowly.
Outside, Officer Daniels was waiting with another officer I had not seen before. This one wore a detective’s badge on a chain around her neck. Mid-forties. Dark hair pulled back. Calm in a way that told me she had walked into many homes after the worst thing had already happened.
“Mr. Whitaker,” she said. “I’m Detective Lauren Hale.”
I shook her hand.
“Do you know where my son is?”
“We’re working on that.”
“Work faster.”
She did not react to my tone.
“We checked the flight information. Brian and Marissa did not board a plane to Florida tonight.”
I stared at her.
“They never left the state.”
“No.”
“Then where are they?”
Detective Hale glanced down at her phone as it buzzed.
Her expression changed.
“We may have a location.”
I waited.
She looked up.
“Mr. Whitaker, does your son own a cabin near Lake Mercer?”
My mouth went dry.
“No,” I said.
Then I remembered.
Carol’s brother had left us an old fishing place years ago. I had given Brian a key after Carol died because he said he needed somewhere quiet to think.
“He doesn’t own it,” I said. “I do.”
Detective Hale’s eyes sharpened.
“Then we need your permission to enter.”
I thought of Lily saying Sunday.
Sunday was three days away.
Three days was a lifetime in a locked closet.
May you like
“You have it,” I said.
And for the first time that night, I hoped my son was afraid.
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