I had never thought of myself as a man who broke into houses.
I had spent most of my life paying bills, keeping promises, and trying to do the right thing even when the right thing was inconvenient.
I believed in knocking before entering.
I believed in giving people privacy.
I believed that family disagreements should be handled inside the family.
That last belief had cost me more than I understood.
Standing outside Daniel's locked house, I realized that none of those rules mattered if Lily was in trouble and I couldn't reach her.
I tried the front door once more.
It didn't move.
I knocked with the side of my fist.
“Daniel, it's Dad. Open the door!”
The sound carried down the street.
No response.
I stepped back and looked toward the windows.
There were no lights inside. I couldn't see anyone moving through the rooms, and I couldn't hear a television or music.
The house looked empty.
But Lily was on the phone.
She was somewhere inside.
That was enough to keep me from leaving.
I called Daniel.
The phone rang several times before the call ended without an answer.
I tried again.
Nothing.
I sent him a short message telling him that Lily was sick and I was outside his house.
Then I called Lily back through the line that had remained open.
“Sweetheart, are you still in your bedroom?”
“Yes.”
“Can you tell me if you can get to the door?”
“I don't think so.”
“That's all right. Don't try to walk if you're feeling weak.”
I was beginning to understand that she wasn't simply waking up with a mild fever.
Her voice had changed.
The words came slowly, and sometimes I had to ask her to repeat herself.
I wanted to know how long she had been feeling this way.
I wanted to know when she had last seen her father.
I wanted to know whether she had taken anything for the fever.
But every question seemed to take more energy than she had.
So I stopped asking the questions that could wait.
I needed to get inside.
I moved along the front of the house, checking the windows from outside without knowing which one would help me.
Most were shut.
The curtains hid the rooms.
I could see a faint outline of furniture through one gap, but nothing that told me where Daniel was.
I called his number again.
Still no answer.
For a moment, I considered returning to my car and driving somewhere I could call for help more easily.
Then Lily coughed.
It was a dry, painful sound.
“Lily?”
“I'm here.”
“Can you breathe all right?”
She hesitated.
“My throat hurts.”
I told her to remain as still and comfortable as she could while I sought help.
My mind kept returning to the same thought.
What if I was already too late?
I had no evidence that anything terrible had happened. A fever could frighten a child without becoming a catastrophe, and children often struggled to explain how they felt.
But a sick child who couldn't tell me where her parent was deserved more than my guesses.
I looked toward the neighboring houses.
I didn't know which neighbors were awake, and I didn't want to waste time explaining the situation to someone who might not understand why I was worried.
That was partly pride.
I can admit that now.
I had spent years trying to preserve the appearance of a family that had no serious problems. I didn't want strangers looking at Daniel's house and wondering what sort of father he was.
As if appearances could keep a child safe.
I took a breath and called out again.
“Daniel!”
My voice sounded strange in the quiet.
I was angry with him, although I didn't yet know what he had done or failed to do.
I was angry with myself, too.
I had noticed things before.
Small things.
A missed visit. A canceled afternoon. Lily becoming unusually quiet when I asked how her week had gone.
Each time, I had found an explanation.
Daniel was busy.
The children were tired.
Parents had difficult days.
All of those things could be true.
They could also become convenient ways to avoid asking a question whose answer might upset everyone.
I had been too willing to accept the easy explanation.
That night, I didn't have the luxury of doing it again.
I moved toward the side of the house.
I called Lily's name through the phone.
“Can you hear me, honey?”
“Yes.”
“I'm still right here.”
“Okay.”
Her reply was barely audible.
I paused beside the wall and tried to orient myself.
I knew the general layout of the house from previous visits. The bedrooms were toward the back, while the living room and kitchen occupied the front.
But knowing the layout did not tell me where Lily was lying or whether she could reach the door.
I looked for a way to enter without putting myself or her at greater risk.
The house remained dark.
I could hear the faint hum of something mechanical from inside, perhaps a refrigerator or an air-conditioning unit.
That ordinary sound made the silence feel worse.
Someone had lived here that evening.
The children's belongings were inside. Their clothes, toys, school things, and the familiar objects they depended on were scattered through rooms I couldn't see.
And now I was outside, unable to reach them.
I tried Daniel again.
This time, I waited through the full ringing cycle.
No answer.
I looked at the time.
Only a few minutes had passed since I arrived, but it felt much longer.
I could not make myself stand still.
I checked the entrance again, then looked toward the windows.
I called emergency services and explained that my eight-year-old granddaughter was ill inside her father's locked home, that I could not reach the father, and that I was unable to get to the child.
I followed the instructions I was given while keeping Lily on the phone.
That decision should have come sooner.
I know that now.
At the time, my mind had narrowed to one purpose: reach Lily and make sure she wasn't alone.
I stayed near the house and kept speaking to her.
“Tell me what you can see.”
“My blanket.”
“What color is it?”
“Purple.”
I remembered buying it for her.
She had chosen it herself after changing her mind three times in the store. She had wanted something soft, something that could fold around her like a little tent when she sat on the couch.
I had teased her about being so particular.
She had smiled and told me that colors mattered.
Now she was staring at that blanket while I stood outside, listening to her struggle through the phone.
“Can you see your door?”
“No.”
“That's okay.”
I tried to keep my breathing steady.
“Just keep talking to me when you can.”
A pause followed.
Then she said something I could barely understand.
“What was that, sweetheart?”
“I want Mason.”
My chest tightened.
“Is Mason in his room?”
“I don't know.”
I looked at the house again.
There was another child inside, and I had no idea whether he was asleep, awake, frightened, or sick himself.
I asked Lily if she could hear her brother.
She said she couldn't.
I didn't ask her to search for him.
She was too unwell to go looking through the house.
Instead, I told her I would find him when I got inside.
The promise came out before I could think about it.
I was determined to keep it.
While I waited for help, I kept looking at the dark windows and remembering the last time I had seen the children.
Lily had been sitting at the kitchen table, drawing on a sheet of paper.
Mason had been on the floor beside her, arranging his plastic dinosaurs in a line.
Daniel had walked through the room and told Mason to pick up his toys.
Nothing about that visit had seemed extraordinary.
I had stayed for a while, talked to the children, and left when Daniel said they had things to do.
I hadn't asked what those things were.
I hadn't noticed whether Lily seemed comfortable.
Or perhaps I had noticed and decided not to make too much of it.
There was a difference between seeing something and allowing yourself to understand it.
I had seen enough to ask more questions.
I simply hadn't wanted to.
A few minutes later, I heard movement from somewhere inside the house.
I turned toward the sound.
It stopped.
I waited, listening.
Nothing followed.
“Lily?”
“Yes?”
“I'm still here.”
“Grandpa, I'm scared.”
I swallowed hard.
“I know, sweetheart.”
I wanted to tell her that nothing bad could happen while I was there.
But I couldn't promise that.
I couldn't even promise how quickly I would reach her.
So I gave her the one thing I could offer honestly.
“You're not facing this by yourself. I'm staying with you.”
She didn't answer.
I listened to her breathing and watched the house.
When the help I had called arrived, I explained the situation again and followed their lead. The urgency was no longer something I could manage through a telephone conversation and a locked front door.
We needed to reach the children.
I stepped aside when instructed.
My hands were shaking.
I hated that they were shaking.
I wanted to be calm, useful, and capable of doing whatever was required.
Instead, I was an old man who had arrived too late to know what was happening inside his own son's house.
Then the way into the house was opened.
I stood at the entrance, looking into the darkness.
For the first time since Lily called, I could move toward her rather than simply imagine where she might be.
I entered carefully, calling her name.
“Lily?”
“Grandpa?”
Her voice came from farther inside.
I followed it.
The house smelled familiar.
The kitchen had the same table where Mason used to line up his dinosaurs. A pair of small shoes sat near the wall, and a schoolbag had been left beside a chair.
Ordinary things.
That was what unsettled me.
Nothing about the rooms immediately explained why my granddaughter had been left sick and frightened without an adult she could reach.
I passed the living room and moved toward the bedrooms.
“Lily, I'm coming.”
“Okay.”
Her voice was weak, but it was closer now.
I reached the hallway and stopped long enough to listen.
There was no sign of Daniel.
I checked the first bedroom, then continued toward the room Lily used.
When I reached her doorway, I found her lying on the bed, her face flushed and her hair damp against her forehead.
She looked smaller than I remembered.
I went straight to her.
“Oh, sweetheart.”
She tried to sit up, but I told her she didn't need to move.
I touched her forehead.
She was frighteningly hot.
I didn't need a thermometer to know that she was unwell.
I knelt beside the bed and took her hand.
“I've got you.”
Her fingers curled around mine.
For several seconds, she simply held on.
I wanted to ask why her father hadn't answered, why nobody had checked on her, and how long she had been lying there feeling so miserable.
Instead, I concentrated on the child in front of me.
I told her that help was there and that she didn't need to get up.
Then I looked around the room.
Something was missing.
Not an object.
A person.
Mason.
I had promised Lily I would find him.
I squeezed her hand gently.
“Sweetheart, I need to check on your brother.”
Her eyes filled again.
She looked toward the hallway.
“Mason.”
The way she said his name made me stop.
She wasn't asking me to bring him into the bedroom.
She was trying to tell me where he was.
Click here to continue reading: PART 3: Lily Was Finally in Front of Me, but the Way She Looked Toward the Hallway Told Me There Was Another Problem
The Phone Rang Before Two in the Morning, and the Little Girl on the Other End Was Too Frightened to Tell Me What Was Wrong
Part 2 of 20
