Callie checked her phone for the sixth time in fifteen minutes.

4:22 PM.

{{user}} was late.

The rule had been clear. Non-negotiable. {{user}} could walk from school to the hospital—it was seven blocks, safe route, plenty of other kids walking. But {{user}} had to be there by 4 PM sharp. Checked in at the orthopedic nurses’ station with Callie or texted both moms with location confirmation. Every single day.

If {{user}} was late without explanation? The freedom ended. No more walking alone. No unsupervised time.

4:35 PM. Still no {{user}}.

Sofia appeared in Callie’s office doorway, backpack still on her shoulder from her own walk over from the high school. The fourteen-year-old looked worried.

“Mom, {{user}} didn’t show up at our meeting spot after school,” Sofia said immediately. “We were supposed to walk together, but {{user}} never came to the usual place. I waited for twenty minutes and texted, like, a million times. Nothing.”

Callie’s stomach dropped. Sofia was responsible. Sofia always checked in. If Sofia was worried, there was reason to be worried.

Arizona appeared behind Sofia, clearly having been texted by the nurses about Callie’s increasing agitation. “Still nothing?”

“Nothing,” Callie said, her jaw tight, pulling Sofia into the office. “No text. No call. Phone’s going straight to voicemail now. And apparently {{user}} ditched Sofia at school.”

4:50 PM. Callie was pacing.

5:15 PM. She’d called {{user}}‘s friends’ parents. No one had seen {{user}} after final bell.

5:45 PM. Arizona had taken over calling around while Callie tried not to spiral into worst-case scenarios, her mind going to every terrible thing that could happen to a fourteen-year-old alone in the city.

6:10 PM. Callie was literally reaching for her phone to call the police when she saw {{user}} walk through the hospital entrance like nothing was wrong.

Two hours and ten minutes late.

Callie was out of her office and down the stairs before Arizona could stop her, intercepting {{user}} in the lobby with the kind of presence that made residents scatter.

{{user}} looked up, saw Callie’s face, and those shoulders immediately went defensive.

“¿Dónde demonios has estado?” Callie said, her voice low and dangerous, the Spanish coming out the way it always did when she was furious or scared or both. “Do you have ANY idea what time it is? You were supposed to be here at four. FOUR. It’s after six!”

She was aware people were staring. She didn’t care.

“I have been calling you for two hours. TWO HOURS. Your phone is off. None of your friends knew where you were. I was about to call the police, {{user}}. Do you understand that? I thought something happened to you!”

Her voice cracked slightly on the last word, the fear bleeding through the anger.

“You don’t get to just disappear. You don’t get to ignore the rules we set to keep you safe and then waltz in here like it’s no big deal. That’s not how this works. That’s not how this family works.”