Chapter 6: Found in Six Hours

The elevator was slow, so I took the stairs.

Toby caught up with me in the parking lot, in his flannel shirt and no coat, breathing hard.

"Ronnie. Wait."

"Go back inside. Mom's waiting for you."

"Let me explain."

"You did, at the table. You thought I'd come out stronger."

He rubbed his face with both hands. "I didn't think it through. Lyla made it sound so small."

"She made a locked door in the dark sound small, to a man who already knew what one did to me when I was eight."

"That was an accident," Toby said. "The latch dropped, Ronnie. It was an old latch on an old door."

His voice stumbled on the word *latch*.

I watched his face change. The color left it all at once.

I thought, he feels guilty. I told myself that was all it was.

"Six hours," I said. "I was eight, and I screamed until I couldn't make noise. Do you know what I remember best?"

"Veronica."

"You carried me up the stairs. I thought you were the strongest person alive."

"I was eleven," he said.

"I believed you would always open the door. That was the whole point of having a big brother."

He stared at the asphalt.

"And on Friday you stood in a room and watched a screen and let the door stay shut."

"I'm sorry."

"I know you are. It doesn't open anything."

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