“Daddy… Mommy’s boyfriend hit me with a baseball bat. He said if I cry, it’ll hurt more…”

To not cross a line I couldn’t undo?

“Relax,” he said, almost in a whisper. “I’m thinking.”

That word, “thinking”, repeated itself in my head as a red light forced me to stop.

Thinking.
When everything inside me was screaming that there was no time for that.

In the background of the call, a male voice spoke, harsh and irritated.

—Who are you? What are you doing here?

Kyle.

I recognized that tone immediately, but now there was something else: a nervous tension, as if I weren’t expecting to meet someone.

Marcus did not respond immediately.

That silence, once again, began to grow between them like a dangerous space.

“I’m here for the child,” Marcus finally said.

Simple. Direct. No frills.

“That’s none of your business,” Kyle replied, louder now. “It’s my house.”

My grip on the steering wheel tightened until my knuckles turned white.

“My house.”

That phrase struck a chord inside me that I had been ignoring for months.

“No,” Marcus said. “It’s not your house.”

A sharp sound, like a blow against a surface, interrupted the air.

Ethan let out a small groan.

—Marcus—I said, my pulse racing—. Get him out of there.

—That’s what I’m doing —he replied—.

But he wasn’t moving.
I could hear him.

It wasn’t moving.