Chapter 2
Milow
A man with a funny mustache opened the door. For a second, he stared at me like I was something strange. I stood there shivering in Daddy’s boots and wondered why he looked at me that way. I was just a little girl, not a monster at all.
The man blinked and muttered something I couldn’t understand, then lowered himself until his face was close to mine. His blue eyes moved over my cheeks, hair, and pajamas like he was trying to figure out what I was.
“Hey, sweetheart,” he said softly. “What are you doing out here?”
I frowned at him. That was a very silly question. If I could speak, I would’ve told him right away. I’d tell him I came because Daddy had foam on his mouth, and there was a monster in my house, and I needed help.
“You must be freezing,” he said. “Come in, sweetheart. Let’s get you warmed up.” He smiled, but his mustache covered most of it. It made him look like he had a furry little animal stuck to his face. Maybe a squirrel.
For a moment, I almost grinned. It would be silly to have a squirrel on your face.
I was unsure at first, but then I let the funny-looking man lead me inside because Daddy needed help.
The fire station was warm and big, and the lights overhead were so very bright that I had to blink to adjust. The man pulled a chair over and helped me sit.
As soon as I lifted my legs, Daddy’s boots slid right off my feet and thumped onto the floor.
My toes curled from the cold, and I pulled them up onto the chair.
The man turned and grabbed a thick blanket from a shelf, wrapping it around my shoulders.
“There you go,” he said, crouching again so he could look at me.
His mustache wiggled a little when he talked.
“Let’s get you warm first. My name’s August, but everyone calls me Gus. What’s your name, sweetheart?”
He waited for me to speak and say my name back, but I couldn’t. Because I was an obedient girl, and obedient girls speak. I stayed still, and my hands fisted in the gloves.
Gus glanced down at my pajamas, then at the giant gloves swallowing my hands. “You came out in this? All by yourself?” His voice sounded worried now.
I nodded once.
Gus let out a slow breath. He rubbed a hand over his face, then stood and called out for someone else in the building. Another man appeared from behind the fire trucks, and their voices filled the space.
I kept sitting there, trying to stay brave while Gus spoke to the other man in a low, serious voice.
Every few seconds, they looked over at me, and each time they did, I wondered if they really knew how to help me at all.
On TV, firefighters always knew exactly what to do.
They saved people all the time. Firefighters were brave and confident.
But Gus and the other man looked unsure, and they didn’t know that I needed help.
I frowned and waited and waited. When my patience ran out, I slid off the chair and pushed my feet back into Daddy’s boots. I took two steps toward Gus, grabbed his hand with both of mine, and pulled as hard as I could.
He looked down at me again and smiled with that silly squirrel mustache of his. But the smile didn’t fix anything, and it didn’t help Daddy.
I tugged harder, my frown growing deeper.
“Can you tell us your name, sweetheart?” Gus asked, crouching in front of me again.
I shook my head and tugged at his hand once more, more desperate this time.
“What’s your name?” the other man asked. He didn’t have a silly mustache, just a serious face with lines on his forehead. He looked older and grumpier, almost like Daddy.
I shook my head again. I didn’t know how else to answer. I couldn’t give them something I couldn’t say.
“Where did you come from? Where do you live?” the grumpy man asked.
I looked at Gus instead, because I liked him better. He was nicer. Then I lifted one hand and pointed toward the door.
“I think she wants to show you,” the grumpy man said.
I nodded quickly, relieved that at least one of them understood what I was trying to tell them.
But Gus sighed and shook his head. “You can’t go back out there, sweetheart. It’s freezing.”
But Daddy is that way. Daddy isn’t moving. Daddy needs help!
“Might have to call the cops,” the grump said as he turned away.
Gus guided me back to the chair again.
Why did they have to call the police when firefighters were already helping people, too? Why didn’t they want to help me get Daddy?
I took off the gloves and pointed at the door again, then lifted my hands and made the scariest face I could, hoping Gus would finally understand. My fingers curled like claws. My eyes went wide, and my mouth stretched open.
His eyebrows lifted. “What’s that? A bear?”
I shook my head and did the face again.
“A monster?” he guessed.
I nodded so fast my head spun.
“There’s a monster? Where?”
I pointed at the door again.
“Outside? In the snow?”
I shook my head. I didn’t know what was in the snow, but I knew the monster that made the foam come out of Daddy’s mouth wasn’t out there. I would’ve seen it otherwise. It was at my house.
I pointed again.
“At your house?” Gus asked.
I nodded hard, then made the scary face again and pointed at Gus, because he was a grown man, and Daddy was a grown man, and maybe that would make him understand better.
But Gus’s eyes only narrowed in confusion. He didn’t get it. He didn’t see what I was trying to show him.
He placed his warm hands on my arms and rubbed gently with his thumbs. “I’m trying, sweetheart. I really am. But I need you to tell me where you live. Do you know the name of your street?”
I stared at him. That was silly. Streets didn’t have names. Streets weren’t people. Why would they need names?
Frustration overcame me, and before I could do anything else, the grumpy man came back, holding a phone in his hand.
“The police are on their way,” he said, glancing between Gus and me. “Won’t be long now.”
When two police officers arrived, one of them asked me the same questions Gus had. He kept answering for me. He sounded calm, and he kept holding my hand, which made me feel safe. The officers wrote things down, but they didn’t smile the way Gus did. They looked serious.
The one asking the questions sighed heavily and told Gus that they’d have to take me to the police station. My stomach tightened. I didn’t want to leave Gus. I needed them to take me home, where Daddy needed help.
I looked up at Gus and squeezed his hand, not wanting him to let me go.
“You’ll be all right,” he told me with a smile as he fixed the blanket around my shoulders again. “They’ll take care of you.”
I shook my head and scooted closer to him on the chair, wrapping one hand around his arm while keeping the other in his.
Gus looked at the police officers. “I’ll go with her.”
“Fine with us,” one officer said.
His hand slid out of mine, and I quickly reached up to him so he would pick me up. My feet were too cold, and I didn’t want to walk anymore. Gus smiled and hooked his hands under my arms, lifting me until I could wrap my arms and legs around him.
We followed the officers outside. The police car looked exactly like the ones on TV, but it was scary to get inside. Normally, only bad people get put in the back of police cars for doing bad things. I didn’t do anything bad. I was trying to help Daddy.
Gus carefully sat me inside, and I grabbed his sleeve to make sure he didn’t leave me here. He smiled again and moved in next to me. “I’m here, kiddo. Don’t you worry.”
I looked up at him wide-eyed and hoped that he could soon understand what I needed. The car started moving, and I stared out the window. Houses passed by slowly, and my chest felt strange. I kept thinking about Daddy and the foam on his mouth, and the monster in the house.
The street we drove on looked familiar. It was the same street I had just walked along before reaching the fire station.
Then I saw my house.
They knew where it was, and they were finally coming to help.
My eyes widened, and I followed the house with my eyes as we got closer.
But the car didn’t slow down.
I started to panic, hitting the window with my hands.
The officer in the front turned. “What’s wrong—”
I hit the window harder, both palms smacking the glass.
“Stop,” Gus said, and the car immediately stopped.
I tried to open the door, but it was locked.
“The house, over there,” Gus said, pointing past me toward my house. “The one with the open door.”
“That’s not good,” the driver said before getting out. The other one twisted around to look at Gus. “Stay here with her,” he said, his voice firm.
“Yeah.” Gus cupped the back of my head with his large hand, caressing my hair gently. Daddy never did that. “That your house, sweetheart?”
I nodded quickly, staring at the house again. Daddy was in there. Or, at least, I hoped he still was.
What if the monster took him away?
My whole body shivered as I watched the officers walk up to the house, and as they went inside, I hoped that the monster wouldn’t get them too. A lot of time went by, and I kept my eyes on the house. The lights turned on upstairs, and I could see the police officer’s shadow in the window.
Gus kept stroking my hair. His hand moved slowly as he said things under his breath, but I didn’t hear any of it. I wanted to run inside and see Daddy. I wanted everything to stop being strange and scary. But the door stayed locked, and the car kept me in place.
“Shit…”
I snapped my head toward Gus. That was a bad word. Daddy always said grown-ups shouldn’t say bad words, and that kids shouldn’t repeat them. Not that I was able to, anyway. Gus had said it out loud, and if I had a voice, I’d scold him for it.
Red and blue lights flashed across his face, and I turned my head back around to see an ambulance rolling to a stop at the front of the house.
Two people stepped out and moved quickly through the snow, carrying a bag and pulling a folded stretcher.
One of the police officers pointed toward the door, and they rushed inside without slowing down.
My eyes stayed glued to the doorway, and I leaned forward as far as the seat belt let me. My heartbeat throbbed so fast I could hear it in my ears.
Gus shifted beside me. “Kiddo…” His voice sounded careful, but I didn’t turn.
I kept waiting and waiting until, finally, the two ambulance people came out again. This time, they were pushing the stretcher with someone on it.
They got the monster!
I smiled widely as relief washed over me.
They caught the thing that hurt Daddy!
They caught it, and now they’re taking it away.
I looked at Gus, expecting him to smile and look happy too.
But Gus wasn’t smiling.
His mouth pressed together tightly under the silly mustache, and his eyebrows pulled low. He looked like he didn’t want me to see his face at all.
I turned back to the stretcher as they rolled it through the snow.
The monster didn’t move.
It didn’t fight.
The monster’s arm hung off the side for a moment before they lifted it.
Why did his arm look like Daddy’s?
My heart tightened. The closer they brought the stretcher to the ambulance, the clearer the shape of the monster under the blanket became.
It didn’t look like a monster.
A monster was big.
I looked at Gus again, wanting him to tell me why the monster didn’t look like one. But he wouldn’t look at me.
My smile disappeared, and my fingers curled into the blanket.
That wasn’t a monster.
That was Daddy.
And that was the last time I ever saw him.