Liam.
"Are they okay?" My voice came out high, terrified. "Dad, are the Walkers okay?"
Mom pulled me away from the window again. "We don't know anything yet, baby. We just need to stay inside and let the police do their job."
Time moved like syrup after that. Minutes felt like hours. I sat on the couch between my parents, watching the news even though they were just reporting on the "incident in South Austin" without any real information. Every time I tried to move toward the door, toward the window, toward my phone to text Liam, one of my parents would stop me.
"Please," I begged. "Just let me check if he's okay."
“We need to stay inside," Dad said firmly, but his voice was strained. "That means everyone stays inside."
It was after midnight when the knock came. Dad went to answer it, Mom's hand tightening on mine. I heard Officer Roberts’ voice—he'd been our neighborhood cop forever, had given us safety talks at school.
"The scene is secure," he said quietly. "But Tom, the Walker kids... their parents didn't make it."
The world tilted. Clemmie with her warm hugs and insistence that I call her by her first name. Harrison with his terrible poker face and dad jokes. Gone.
I was up and moving before Mom could grab me, shoving past Dad and Officer Roberts, bursting out our front door.
Liam was standing in his front yard. Just standing there, still as stone, still wearing the same t-shirt and jeans from dinner. Sophia was pressed against his side, her face buried in his shirt, her whole body shaking with sobs.
"Liam!" I ran to him, barefoot on the cool grass, not caring about the police tape or the officers who tried to stop me.
He turned at my voice, and the look on his face broke something in me. Empty. Shocked. Lost. Like someone had reached inside and turned off all his lights.
I crashed into him, wrapping my arms around both him and Sophia. He didn't move at first, didn't respond, just stood there trembling under my touch.
“Steph, honey… come back inside.” Mom’s voice floated out behind me, soft but fraying at the edges.
“No.” My arms tightened around Sophia’s trembling body. “I’m not leaving them.”
She was shaking so hard her teeth clicked, tiny hands fisted in the back of Liam’s shirt like he was the only thing tethering her to earth. Liam stood statue-still beside us—too still for a boy his age. His face was blank, expression carved into something too calm, too adult. His shoulders were rigid, his jaw locked so tight a muscle kept twitching.
Mom and Dad stepped onto the porch behind me. They looked at each other—fear, urgency, heartbreak—all in one glance that passed over the top of my head.
Then Dad’s voice, low and steady, the voice he saved for emergencies.
“Bring them both. They can stay with us tonight.”
Officer Roberts shifted awkwardly, clipboard in hand. “The social worker?—”
“—can talk to us in the morning,” Mom cut in, voice hardening in that way that made grown men rethink their life choices. “These kids are not spending the night in a police station or a stranger’s house. They’re coming with us. They have an aunt and uncle in Copper Creek—we’ll call them.”
Somehow—through coaxing and soft words and the officer’s gentle hands—we got Sophia inside. She clung to Liam the entire time, sobbing so hard she was hiccuping. Liam never moved his arm from around her shoulders, never said a word. He walked like he was carrying something too heavy for him. Like if he stopped moving, even for a second, it would crush him.
Mom organized the pullout set up in the finished basement—ourbasement—where Liam and I had spent years building blanket forts and playing video games. It felt wrong now. Too bright. Too safe. Too normal while their world had just exploded.
Dad came down with the cordless phone. “We’re going to call your aunt and uncle, okay? They’ll come get you.”
“I’ll call them,” Liam said suddenly. His voice didn’t sound like Liam. Didn’t sound like any kid I’d ever known. It was low. Controlled. Hollow.
“Of course.” Dad put the phone in his hands. “Do you remember the number?”
Liam nodded. His hands shook—just barely—but he steadied them against his knees and dialed. Each beep of the buttons sounded too loud in the quiet room.
He held the phone to his ear and stared straight ahead, not blinking.
“Uncle Owen?” His voice cracked on the first word, but he swallowed it down. “Yes, sir.” A tiny pause. He squeezed hiseyes shut. “There was… something happened.” He took a sharp breath, chest shuddering. “Mom and Dad are dead.”
