“Do you have any idea how worried I’ve been? And when I finally found you today… why did you run from me?”
Daniel stared down at the table, unable to meet her eyes.
“I wasn’t running from you, Mom,” he said quietly.
“Then why?” Sarah asked gently.
“Because of Maya,” he replied.
“I was trying to protect her.”
And then Daniel told his mother everything.
In the weeks before he disappeared, Maya had begun confiding in Daniel about her increasingly dangerous home situation.
Her stepfather had been growing more unpredictable and violent—yelling every night, breaking household items, creating an atmosphere of constant fear.
“She told me she was scared,” Daniel explained.
“Really scared, not just uncomfortable.”
Sarah remembered the hard-faced man who had answered Maya’s door nearly a year ago.
“I think I met him,” she whispered.
Daniel nodded grimly.
“He lied to you, Mom. Maya never went to stay with her grandparents.”
“She was planning to run away that day.”
One afternoon Maya arrived at school with a bag already packed with essential belongings.
