Chapter 7 - The Tragedy of Sophie
The broken window was the beginning of the end.
Ethan tried to seal the gaping frame using heavy cardboard boxes and silver duct tape he bought with his last five dollars, but the freezing wind ripped through the makeshift barrier every night.
Three days after the window broke, five-year-old Sophie stopped eating entirely.
Her skin turned pale gray, her lips cracked and bled, and her breathing became shallow, rapid, and wheezing. She lay on the sofa, her small body burning with a fever so high that when Ethan touched her forehead, it felt like touching a hot stove.
“Ethan...” Sophie whispered, her small, frail hand reaching up, clutching his sweater sleeve. “Is Mommy... coming with the blue coat today?”
Ethan knelt beside the sofa, holding her tiny, freezing hand against his face. Tears streamed down his cheeks without stopping. “She... she’s trying, Soph. She’s trying really hard.”
“I’m tired, Ethan,” the five-year-old murmured, her eyelids fluttering shut. “My chest... hurts when I breathe.”
“Lily! Get the hot water bottle!” Ethan screamed, his voice cracking with pure, unadulterated panic. “Ben! Get more blankets!”
Lily came running out of the kitchen, her eyes wide with terror as she looked at her baby sister’s blue-tinted lips. “Ethan... she’s not looking at us! Ethan! Do something!”
Ethan looked at his sister. He looked at the door of Apartment 3B—the door he had kept locked for three long, horrific months to keep their terrible secret safe from the world.
He realized the brutal, agonizing truth: his pride, his fear, his desire to keep them together... was killing his little sister.
“I’m going for help,” Ethan choked out, standing up. “Lily, keep her wrapped up! I’m going to get a doctor!”
“Ethan, no!” Lily cried, grabbing his arm. “If you go out there and bring someone, they’ll take us away!”
“I don't care anymore!” Ethan screamed, tears blinding his vision. “She’s dying, Lil! Sophie is dying!”
He yanked the front door open, throwing it wide against the hallway wall, and sprinted down the stairs two at a time, his bare canvas shoes sliding over the steps.
He burst out through the heavy glass doors of the apartment building and ran down Willow Street into the howling snowstorm, screaming for help at the top of his lungs.
“HELP! SOMEBODY HELP MY SISTER! PLEASE!”
Three blocks away, Detective Marcus Miller was sitting in his parked unmarked police cruiser, drinking a cup of stale black coffee, still following up on his hunch about the desperate boy from the pharmacy.
He heard the faint, frantic screaming over the sound of the wind.
Miller threw open his car door, stepping out into the snow, pulling his flashlight from his belt.
He saw a thin thirteen-year-old boy collapse into a snowbank at the corner of Willow Street, sobbing uncontrollably, his bare hands digging into the ice.
Miller ran over, scooping the boy up by his arms. “Ethan! Ethan, what’s wrong?!”
Ethan looked up into the cop’s face, his eyes wild with grief, his teeth chattering uncontrollably. “My sister... Apartment 3B... she’s five... she stopped breathing... PLEASE!”
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Detective Miller didn't ask another question. He grabbed his radio, shouted into the mic: “Dispatch, this is Unit 12. I need an advanced life support ambulance at 142 Willow Street, Apartment 3B! NOW!”
Miller picked Ethan up, slung him over his shoulder, and sprinted toward the worn-down building on Willow Street.
