Chapter 2Door Kept Wide Open

They only stayed with us for four days before going back to finish the school week.

On the morning they were scheduled to leave, I walked into the hallway and found their sneakers neatly tucked away inside plastic grocery bags, sitting on top of their duffels.

"What are the shoes in bags for?" I asked.

Ethan cleared his throat. "We're leaving. We didn't want our clutter in your way."

I walked over, unknotted the bags, pulled the sneakers out, and set them side by side on the shoe rack by the coat hooks.

"You’re going to need them when you come back. What’s the point of packing and unpacking them like you're guests at a hotel?"

Hannah’s eyes flared with sudden, desperate light, though she ducked her head to hide it.

"We can... we can come back?" she asked, her voice cracking.

"The guest bed already knows your shape," I said, bustling past her. "Saves me the trouble of teaching you how to work the tricky shower knob all over again."

They stood rooted to the hardwood, neither of them daring to move.

I knew that look. They were waiting for the catch. They didn't trust that safety was something you didn't have to pay for.

I pushed two thick, brand-new fleece blankets into their arms.

"It gets down into the twenties after Thanksgiving. These will keep your beds warm at night."

Ethan protested instantly. "We usually just sleep in our coats. It's fine."

I glared at him. "Take off your coats when you sleep. Stop bundling yourselves up like wrapped packages. This house isn't so poor that we can't spare two blankets."

Before they got into Mark’s car, I stood on the porch and leaned down. "Call your dad the Friday before your next break."

Hannah looked up, her fingers twisting the zipper of her new jacket. "Ma'am... what if Dad doesn't answer?"

"Call my cell," I said.

She chewed her lip. "What if it's late? What if you're asleep?"

I held her gaze, refusing to let her look away.

"If somebody is hurting you, or you’re scared, I don’t care if it's three o'clock in the morning. You call."

I thought that was enough.

I was naive enough to believe that leaving a door unlocked and keeping hot food on the stove was enough to build a sanctuary.

I didn't realize that fear doesn't stay behind when children walk across a threshold. It travels inside their bones.

A couple of weeks later, Mark mentioned that Hannah had shyly asked if he could make his sweet-and-sour ribs the next time they visited.

"First time she’s ever actually requested a dish," I told him, rolling my eyes with affection. "Go easy on the cider vinegar this time. Last batch about stripped the enamel off my molars."

But on Saturday morning, an hour before Mark was set to pick them up, the phone rang.

It was Ethan.

"Dad... we can't come over this weekend. Mom said we have to stay home and look after Toby."

Mark’s face tightened. "Do you guys want to come over?"

There was a long, suffocating silence on the other end of the line.

Then Hannah’s voice drifted through, muffled and strained. "Mom said... Mom said it’s been months since we had a proper family dinner together."

I reached over and took the phone from Mark. "Hannah, honey. If you want to spend time with your mother, you go ahead and do that. But if you need anything, you call your dad."

"Okay, Rita," she whispered, her voice tight with panic. "Please don't throw out the ribs. Please don't let them go to waste."

"They're in the freezer," I said gently. "They aren't going anywhere."

That night, around ten-thirty, my bedside lamp was already clicked off. Mark was dead asleep beside me when my phone buzzed violently against the nightstand.

The screen lit up: Hannah.

I swiped the screen. "Hannah?"

A ragged, choking sob burst through the speaker. She was crying so hard she couldn't catch her breath, hyperventilating into the mic.

"Rita... please... can you tell Dad to come get us? Ethan’s bleeding. There's... there's blood everywhere."