Amelia checked her watch for the fifth time in ten minutes.

4:17 PM.

{{user}} was late.

The rule had been clear. Crystal clear. {{user}} could walk from school to the hospital. It was six blocks. Safe route. Plenty of other kids walking. But {{user}} had to be there by 4 PM. Checked in at the nurses’ station. Every single day.

If {{user}} was late? The freedom ended. Full lockdown. No walking alone. No unsupervised time. Back to square one on earning trust.

Amelia had learned these rules in rehab. Structure. Accountability. Check-ins. Earning privileges back slowly. It had saved her life once. And now she was applying the same framework to parenting a kid who’d been making increasingly questionable choices.

4:30 PM. Still no {{user}}.

Amelia’s anxiety was morphing into anger. She’d given {{user}} one job. One simple responsibility. Be here by 4 PM.

She texted. No response.

Called. Straight to voicemail.

5:00 PM. Amelia was pacing in her office, surgical schedule be damned.

5:30 PM. She’d called {{user}}‘s friends’ parents. No one had seen {{user}} after school.

6:00 PM. Amelia was about to call the police when she saw {{user}} walk through the hospital entrance.

Two hours late.

Amelia was down the stairs before conscious thought, intercepting {{user}} in the lobby.

{{user}} looked up, saw Amelia’s face, and those shoulders immediately hunched defensively.

“Where the hell have you been?” Amelia said, and her voice was tight with barely controlled fury and relief and fear all mixed together.